SOCIAJ , ST 
OF THE 



ELMER T.CL. 



R..T 



flHEl 

A PAPER PUBLISI 




PE 

IONS. 



EKMANY ... 10 We 
tntk COUNTKIES » Pig 



rs 



Class ___5X1_ 

Book j 

Gopyiight]\ ]0 _ 




LLOYD GEORGE, ADRESSING THE SAMMIES: 

! 'My bay, are yon able to appreciate the high honur that yua arc permiitett to die tor Engjantj I" 



NEWSfromAMERICA. 

Symptoms of Imminent Awakening, 

Even the Chicago "Oaily Trihtme" takes ex- 
ception to English censoring of American 
Press Dispatches. 

tajting 



Since the United Statu o- 
active part in the war and al!o\v 
men to spill their Wood on Etirt 
first and iast European causes, 
meo over in America begin to 
and more Ibui it won't do to 
uHi-jiu.Uwn exclusively with ! 
As Ion£ as America's ijit<i '-^t 
was more or Jess of a th. -oi.'ii. ■. 
tary character it was not d. em 
to probe the veracity of eve,;- ( 
received via England, hut *in 
Moo 1 ■- Ilov.it.e. i-iun llio,,- hi, 



their young 



i;:i.'! Itid 



WATH ARE YOU FIGHTING FOR, SAMMY? 



Tio % li.v.-r lell vim lil.lt all Hi. -e Hiii.?- 
i,l,ii/ ,-i-rei.ti ror the real I bine you are rivh: 
mind iiit.l tin; Almighty PoteJ . 

Tiii- i- what v,ni :irv' lighting tor! 

This is what all tin AM- at. Millie to. 

This is what Ih- who!.- war in fought for! 

Tin- i„ what for Hoods o"r blood, and tom 
i it! Hearts must break. 

Tlits war is not the Battle of Uie Lord. 5 

And ye!, strange to say, it is not fongHt 
,,< IhikIiI l.y Ui" happy . .. .■,„■-. ,H of 1!., 
io -.ii,,l,!,r- m Wall Street and Thread lire, f 



•dtlor, of the 

i stores ami 



WAR NEWS. 

The fifth Anniversary of tlte'War. 

A «ad niroiveoary ! — Ever since tlie u«- 
naliiral niton.- Mivaon the oW foes. 
Kneland and lUwsia, was concluded, tie 
world knew that mi European «jar was ine- 
vitable K»«Un.l's hMorl.td poli.y, always 
to rro-di iier most dangerous commercial 
uv.,1. i-ii.. m. H.Klaift, Denmark, France), 
d,,„and.-l .lie c.»*bing of Germany. Hus-i* 
wauled th- control of Uie Baukan-Stales and 
I,. ii.i;.ui,.*f. and Franee w«* craving .far 
•!l-\ ait-he' tui-' ..icMentally for Atsace-laM* 
rrniie and, if i ..<- - U.}--, for the toft side ot 
Hie Chine. trial anil fb» 

official dCHii) . ails hue 

proven the fact that !t»e Bstente. intended 
to annihilate Germany. ■ 

Germany's doom «es>Bte<i to be sore. i 
Rut the devilish, plot of tie Entente 4$ 
not ■iicotit and liiur will succeed! ' , 



PAGE OF THE GERMAN PROPAGANDA ORGAN, "AMERICA IN 
EUROPE/' PUBLISHED FOR CIRCULATION AMONG AMERICAN TROOPS 



AMERICA IN EUROPE. 



AUGUST 5. I91S. 



bo would gel 

nld be debit; 



* have been shipped •■•> Fnn.e bv Mar of ihi- 
d for delivery by July! Bui these 87 haven't 
ks ago six Anurirr.li liters .nine to grief near 

:u-York Times was in the dark, and demanded 
>n.d committee, no, bv a grand jury! And as 

Tie people who were - anxious for war knew 
:■•■ leun.l ... -inn./. And they knew also that 

«,y as soon as Ibey 'had swallowed sohw high 
some catch phrases. The expenses for doling 
it ot the proceeds of the war, for no war was 
a* this one. Money is poured out like water, 
ime to. the ret cue of the endangered money of 

a little vvar they hoped to pet it all back. Yet 
-ge.l war the w'ortd bus ever seen or ever will 
.• is lost. Therefore they are yelling at the top 
for the dollar, oh no! Only for help for the 
lurkhas und Senegalese negroes, and for help 
undred wo are just crazy to have the Bowery 
iday and Eveline Pankhurst are. yelling loo — 



ttlefielri, 

blockade", a.- Mr. (to/-, 
blockade before joining 
U4 us hope thai l 
iideislund this and alsi 
lias repeatedly don,., 
enter into peiH'--negL.I..: 



nd for 



J no 



Objectionable Historical Facts. 



(si- .lite* , 

lii.uiy. Ai 



isked to do your bit at home in the Red 
ntrosted with the glorious task to do the 
;. To vo« is left the immortal honor of a mortal wound or a somewhat precipitate 
And wiiat an honor It must be to die for John Pierpont or for Charley Schwab 
the Du Pouts! They all hope you will be fttlry aware of this honor, 
higher -till ami more lowering must be the distinction that you are allowed lo 
limed for life or get killed straigbl for Hi« Britannic. Haughtiness, the British 
! The dollar — well, he is some relative of yours, even h" he shons you mora? 
ou like. But Hie Pound Sterling uio't make ym feel +romesick, even if it is kith 
l of the dollar, just as 

The colonels lady 
And Mary O' Grady 
Are slaters under the skin. 
Pound and the Dollar - that It what you are flgbtinu fort 
you arc expected lo appreciate the honor that fell to your lot. 
e.atiy John Bull expects every Frenchman and every American to do his duty 
11. In China, during the Boxer uprising, the British general culled, "tlic Germans 
front". .Now, in Prance, he calls the Sammies. It must be a great satisfaction 
ver the call! 



illustrious School Board considers America 
u morally too uncertain to be confronted 
willi historical truth? What an insult to 
protect Ihe United Slates aigainst truth! 
This insinuation really means; America is 
in danger when she sees Germany as she 
really is and no! as England has painted 



5 San Fi 


anciseo raid against 






us Milan 


t is not delieient .1 


bv-pby 


.inna F. Crwfa-cU 




nar School objected 




■Brn-I mi den Kui-er" 




: "There is inueh of 




Ihe letter the child 


.■ll',|.T01' 


, she protests. But 




Sehool Department 


sided - 




object io 


i by inking mil the 


in.) ,-ub-l 


luting the word Prc- 




,st.r-,iroke! So the 




epted, is sanctioned, 




devote itself lo the 




t is, spirits are rather 


my enuttii 


nids of School boards 




1 «i» Ibe substitution 


,r Kaiser 


vill hardly regain tile 


Kaiser" 


or the San rranchen 



iB 



,AD EMS r*33<J 



!) mit parkartigem Garten a 

■ bkiKt • Q 

() angenehmen ErtiolungsauferrthaJt () 



Wilson's Methods 

can't win the War. 

caking on the various investigations ol 
U. S, Aerial service Senator Brandegee 
unecticut according to the N. Y. Evening 

made the following drastic statement 
e United States Senate: — 
■he President has already two « 
the Lord only knows if he will make 

public should there be anything 



a co-ordination, let's co-ordinate. 

r is not going to be won by Colonel 
>r by any favorite of the President 
can't win this war by talking about 
suffrage and prohibition. We 

war by sitting around at pink teas 
sing about putting pink chemise on 
i and knee-breeches on the won* 

down to brass-tacks. Lets find c 

Lets investigate these irregulariti 

ion-partisan way and report t. t 



Against Jdlers. 

ier it new state law passed at a s 
l of Ihe legislature, declaring thos 
■k, of whatever class, and not occupied 
y useful occupation, shall be declared 
' of sedition, the Omaha polio 
enced to arrest all idlers. The interesting 
an is if the Omaha police looks upon 
liilionair who is idling away half the 
in his swell clubr'ooros us an id 
use of Ihe new law. 



Italy suffered a c 
an. West England s 
g to check the offer 
Lodendorff which b 



.v,y. 



e "unlawful; 

the English i 



For lion 



jood' fellowship among al! nations I 



The booty of the Central-Powers 
after four years of war. 

r.a. bhU«. 

At the end of Ihe fourth year of war 

! number of prisoners stationed in camps 

of the Central-Powers amounts to more than 

3,800,000 of whom 2,300,000 are in Germany. 

The last year alone has increased their 

number by 840,000 men. 

As far as booty of war-matei ial is concerned 

there were on August 2nd. 1917 12,156' 
nowi23,000, the number of machine 
during the same period climbed from 

8352 lo 38.000, that of vehicles from 10.640 
65,000. Not counting the destroyed ones, 
? number of captured Tanks is 365. 
Furthermore, to the number of rifles were 
ded since die first ot August 1st 7 one 

million, lo that of Artillerie ammunition at. 

million rounds, and of Infaiilry-amiuunilion 

200 million rounds. Moreover 3000 Loco- 
;es and 28.000 railroad-cars were taken, 
his enormous booty shows how the 

German General stuff accomplished its aim 
weaken the fighting-force of the Allies, 
I to decrease their national-wealth by 

bitlions. 



TflE WAR AND THE TAM-EOLOTH. 
The fallowing lines in the Pittsburgh Cbronicle- 
Tetegrapb seem lo imply that ibe United States are 
also threatened with a shortage of linen: 

Get up. You lary s 



firstSaoimy: The theatre* dour go to very Baa 
after all. My enter is playing al present 1 
La a show and get» almost the whole 
pay of a Colonel 

Second Sammy ■ (afief redeclion) What doe* the wife ; 
of Ibe Colonel say to Hut ' 

- To satisfy and farther stimulate haired against i 

eiveuntbelre- n ■ - 'lie "Kaiseriol 



cabbage' 1 . Quile appropriate! 



an army against hie will. He serves as 
butcher and principal cook and now baa been made 
sergeant, everything against bis will m trte America, j 
Ob, sweet land ot Liberty! 



PALMENOARTEN FRANKFURT 

Bclicbtcster VcrgnOgmigsplatr Gro6-Frankrurts. 



:: Relchhalttge Mfttags- ___ 

•.e Blere -:- Retoe neue a. altt Weine 
rack u-SormUg gro8i 



PAGE OF THE GERMAN PROPAGANDA ORGAN, "AMERICA IN 
EUROPE," PUBLISHED FOR CIRCULATION AMONG AMERICAN TROOPS 



SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 
ELMER T. CLARK 




DR. ELMER T. CLARK IN TRENCH EQUIPMENT 



SOCIAL STUDIES 
OF THE WAR 



BY 

ELMER T. CLARK 



ILLUSTRATED 




NEW ^E*r YORK 
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 



.0 ** 



Copyright, iqiq 
George H. Doran Company 



Printed in the United States of America 



©CU525961 

M 21 !9!9 



PREFACE 

One is perhaps guilty of an unwarranted rashness 
when he submits another contribution to the multitude 
of discussions which have covered so many phases of 
the great world war, especially since it comes after 
hostilities have ceased, and I gather courage to risk it 
only from the fact that the subjects with which these 
essays deal have not been adequately interpreted to the 
American people. Indeed they have scarcely been 
touched at all, and yet they are of vital importance to 
our thinking and to the settlement of the lines along 
which our social effort is to proceed in the future. 

When there are so many voices calling us to follow 
them, and since so many of them are calling us in oppo- 
site directions, one should present his credentials be- 
fore he presumes to speak. During the time which I 
spent on the western front with the American armies, 
it fell to my unfortunate lot to be drafted many times 
for the purpose of guiding sight-seers through the sec- 
tor we occupied, and I became very familiar with the 
tourist who came out to spend a day and see "the ter- 
rible war." Many times they were veritable nuisances, 
yet from them we secured a great deal of amusement. 
These people, returning to America, have enlightened 
the public so thoroughly on all the events and move- 



vi PREFACE 

ments of the war that one is sometimes inclined to think 
that nothing more remains to be said on the subject. 
The shorter the stay abroad the more authority does 
one frequently throw into his utterances; and so I am 
persuaded that every person who writes should attach 
to his writing a full statement of the experience which 
qualifies him to put his pen to paper. 

I remember one person who was quite frank in this 
regard. The regularity with which I guided tourists 
across No Man's Land had become a joke among the 
officers of the regiment, and we would sometimes gather 
in the evening to recount the experiences of these won- 
dering visitors at the front. One night the chaplain 
came into the assembly with a copy of a well-known 
magazine which contained an article on some general 
subject connected with the welfare of the American 
soldier. The writer began by announcing that he 
had the answer to all the questions the people had 
been asking about the welfare of their boys in France, 
and as proof of this he cited and numbered his 
experiences. He had spent ten days with five hun- 
dred officers, presumably on the transport which car- 
ried those officers to France. He had visited general 
headquarters, which was a hundred miles behind the 
lines, and had a conversation with Pershing. He had 
talked with doctors, officers, and leading people. He 
had lived four days in a Y. M. C. A. dug-out at the 
front. These and similar facts were the basis on which 
he rested his statement that he had the answers to all 
the questions the people were asking. Naturally, there 



PREFACE vii 

was great glee among the officers when the chaplain 
read to us the article in question. Nevertheless the 
journalist established a good precedent, and one which 
I shall here follow. 

Since the entry of the United States into the war 
I have made two extended trips through certain of 
the European nations involved, and I was accredited 
as a correspondent by the foreign offices of both Lon- 
don and Paris. The first trip was undertaken for 
the sole purpose of making intensive social investiga- 
tions for the daily and religious press of America; on 
the second I was commissioned to do some special jour- 
nalistic work for the Young Men's Christian Associa- 
tion, and also to continue the social studies I had pre- 
viously made for the press. On these journeys I have 
gone into all sections of England, Scotland, Ireland, 
France, and Italy, visiting all of the great cities and a 
multitude of smaller towns and villages. In more than 
one hundred and fifty centers I have studied social 
conditions in relation to the soldiers, the civilian pop- 
ulation, and the various institutions of the world's 
activities. I have gone into the churches, the schools, 
the universities, the factories, and the homes of the 
people; I have lived in the east end of London and 
shared the life of the people down Whitechapel way; 
in Eome, London, Dublin, Paris, and a hundred other 
places, I have mixed freely with the common people 
of the streets. Night after night and day after day 
I have watched the evil machinations of the most sinis- 
ter agencies working in European society, and for a 



v iii PREFACE 

year I have delved into the facts and the causes of the 
reign of immorality in the warring countries; I know 
personally scores of persons involved, I have heard the 
stories in courts of justice, I have seen the workings 
of the devilish agencies with my own eyes. And in 
the same degree I have studied as best I could the other 
social institutions and influences. 

As regards the actual war itself, I have not been 
altogether lacking in opportunities for study. I have 
been in scores of military centers of all kinds; I have 
visited and personally inspected rest camps, base hos- 
pitals, convalescent camps, training centers, munition 
factories, ordnance plants, lumber camps, aerial train- 
ing centers, naval aviation stations, construction camps, 
mine bases, destroyer bases, submarine bases, army 
headquarters, and ports of entry. I have lived for an 
extended period with the fighting men of the American 
armies, marching with them across Trance and moving 
with them into the front lines. For months I have 
lived with a division under the enemy's fire, sleeping 
in the trenches and dug-outs, moving at will through 
support lines, front trenches, and outposts in No Man's 
Land, and in every way sharing the experiences of the 
men. I have driven a truck for many successive nights 
through the American sector, where nothing could 
move in the light of day, along roads choked with traf- 
fic and swept by the enemy's fire. I have messed and 
lived in the wrecked and ruined villages of northern 
France, and from the last observation post watched the 
enemy in his own lines. I have been through forty air 



PREFACE ix 

raids and a dozen gas attacks. I have spoken to soldier 
audiences in machine gun emplacements and dug-outs 
while the shells burst about us ; I have associated with 
enemy prisoners, and have seen our own men mangled, 
bleeding, and dying. In the great hospitals I have 
undressed them, have served as a stretcher bearer, and 
have heard their stories as they lay pale and helpless 
at the door of death. But why prolong an egoistic 
recital! I have shared in the experiences of the sol- 
diers and have lived their life, I have seen the terrors 
of the war in all of its departments, and I have investi- 
gated social conditions as thoroughly as possible all 
over the allied nations which I visited. Out of this 
experience I give these essays. 

Two or three explanatory remarks should be made. 
One is that I approach all questions from the stand- 
point of the average man on the streets, and the con- 
clusions set forth are from his point of view. I have 
been criticized frequently, and my conclusions have 
been disputed, by clergymen and others who have 
looked at things through their own glasses. Especially 
have I been berated for my revelations concerning im- 
morality; some have denounced me because they 
doubted the statements, others because they did not 
think the situation should be revealed. I can only 
reply that I have simply told what I absolutely know 
to be the facts, and I think the truth should be told. 
Two of my close friends took offense when my dis- 
patches were first published in regard to the moral 
breakdown; I later met both of them in London, and 



x PREFACE 

both of them then apologized for the attitude they had 
taken prior to seeing matters for themselves. One in 
my position, after having been severely condemned 
early in 1917 for the publication of dispatches reveal- 
ing the deplorable situation in the cities of Europe, may 
be pardoned for welcoming the verifications, like that 
of Alfred Noyes in The Saturday Evening Post, which 
have been openly admitted since the cessation of hos- 
tilities. 

In these articles one will find certain repetitions 
here and there, and there will appear differences in the 
matter of tense, etc. It is sufficient to say that some 
of the material has been published in another form, and 
all of the articles were written independently and at 
different times. The New York Tribune and the St. 
Louis Republic have kindly consented to the reworking 
and republication of the material herein. I claim no un- 
usual degree of insight or information over other peo- 
ple who have visited the war zones ; I only seek to write 
from a different standpoint and with absolute freedom. 
If the essays throw any light on any phase of society 
in these times, and especially if they will enable any 
American organization to see how suffering Europe 
may be helped, I shall be amply repaid for the writing. 

ELMER T. CLARK. 



CONTENTS 

PREFACE PAGE 

I Immorality in Europe During the War . 17 

II What Does Ireland Intend? 46 

III The Root of the Irish Question ... 66 

IV The Pope and the War 87 

V The Religious Situation in the War . . 106 

VI The Clergy and the People 136 

VII The Church and the War 152 

VIII Reconstruction in Religion after the War 171 

IX The Challenge of the War to the Church 201 

X The Germans and the Turks .... 226 

XI Among the Toilers ......... 240 

XII A Heritage of Hate 252 

XIII The Cities of Horrible Nights . . . .261 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

Dr. Elmer T. Clark in Trench Equipment Frontispiece 

PAGE 

Proclamations of the Mansion House Con- 
ference and the Roman Catholic Church 
Urging the Irish to Resist Conscription . . 48 

Corner of Sackeville Street in Dublin after 
the Sinn Fein Rebellion of 1916 .... 80 

Wrecked Shop in Dublin after the Sinn Fein 
Rebellion of 1916 80 

Irish Anti-Conscription Pledge 96 

American Lumbermen in the Scotch Highlands, 
The First Contingent of the A. E. F. to Land 
on European Soil 128 

Y. M. C. A. Hut in the Woods Miles from Any 
Town or Habitation 128 

German Propaganda: "In the Trenches — 'Be- 
hold I Am with You Always* " 232 

German Propaganda: "At The Advance Posts — 
T am The Good Shepherd' " 232 

"Le Vieux Dieu Allemand." The French Con- 
ception of the German God 256 



Xlll 



SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 



SOCIAL STUDIES 
OF THE WAR 



• CHAPTEE I 

IMMORALITY IN EUROPE DURING THE WAR 

We are accustomed to hearing that war acts as a 
regenerator of the national life, bringing patriotism, 
sacrifice, unselfishness, and devotion to principle for- 
ward to such a degree as to produce a more virile and 
devoted citizenship. It may be that such a contention 
has a certain foundation in fact upon the one side, yet 
the most casual observer of events in the great Euro- 
pean war must be impressed with the fact that this 
struggle is breeding enough immorality and vice to 
overwhelmingly counter-balance any such spiritual 
gains that may perchance accrue. The war has bred 
viciousness in an amazing fashion, and there is a de- 
mand, therefore, for some very plain speaking and a 
frank recognition of a critical condition in order to 
insure our social salvation. 

To one interested in the problems of society the most 
apparent fact in connection with the war is this great 

17 



18 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

increase in immorality. In every European city vice 
is rampant. It stalks the streets openly, day and night, 
and with brazen effrontery flaunts itself in the face of 
the law, order, and all moral conceptions. So deplor- 
able has the situation become that there is small danger 
of exaggerating its seriousness. While there has been 
a decrease in what we usually regard as the more fla- 
grant forms of crime, burglary, highway robbery, mur- 
der, and the like, owing to the fact that the men, who 
usually commit such crimes, have been placed in the 
armies, misbehavior of the more unmentionable type 
has received the greatest impetus it has ever known. 
And to-day the streets of London, Paris, Kome, and 
other cities are veritable cesspools of iniquity. So 
much so, indeed, that the sojourner in these places 
feels as if they have abandoned all moral restraints and 
thrown to the winds all desires and attempts to pre- 
serve the purity and the health of their people. 

In all of these cities the streets are thronged with 
women of the underworld. There are thousands upon 
thousands of them, moving here and there in the dark- 
ened avenues and plying their trade with the utmost 
abandon and boldness. So prolific are they that it is 
nothing unusual to see four or five girls accost a man 
simultaneously and fall to disputing among themselves 
as to which has the prior claim upon his attentions; 
and so bold are they that they frequent constantly the 
lounges and the tea rooms of the best hotels with per- 
fect freedom and confidence. The courtesans have an 
especial predilection for the soldiers, and these men, 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 19 

many of whom come from distant colonies overseas and 
are without friends in the great centers of European 
population, fall easy prey to their machinations. So 
alarming are the proportions which the vice problem 
has assumed on account of the war that the casual 
observer is almost constrained to believe that the whole 
moral fabric of the nations has been destroyed. 

The causes for such a state of affairs are very ap- 
parent. In the first place the problem is aggravated by 
the thousands of refugees who have been driven into 
foreign cities. These refugees have furnished a large 
per cent of the immoral women, hundreds of them 
drifting to the street under the pressure of economic 
and social needs. Then there are the wives and the 
widows of the soldiers, who, in the absence of the 
husbands, have become degenerate. It is a remarkable 
fact that nearly all of these women claim to belong to 
this class; I have spoken to a large number of them, 
and almost without exception they have claimed that 
their husbands are in the army or have fallen on the 
fields. One may not judge whether the statements are 
true or whether the women believe there is an especial 
virtue in having a man with the colors, but it is well 
known that the absence of the men is one of the largest 
factors in the increase of crime. Here is a young 
woman whose husband has cared for her in all things, 
furnishing her the support, the companionship, and the 
amusement which her nature has desired. The young 
man is taken into the army, and at once the companion- 
ship, the amusement, and most of the support is with- 



20 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

drawn. The young woman becomes the victim of an 
intense loneliness. She can no longer live in the man- 
ner to which she has become accustomed, and unless 
she is a strong character, or is willing to seek employ- 
ment, both for its income and for the occupation itself, 
she will have difficulty in adjusting herself to the new 
condition. She seeks companionship and diversion, 
finding both in the public house or saloon, which is a 
social institution and which prevalent ideas permit her 
to frequent without a compromise. Naturally, the 
friends she makes at the public house do not strengthen 
her moral determinations, and the liquor she drinks 
causes her to lose her sense of restraint. And from 
this environment she drifts to the streets through a 
gradual evolution, and in accordance with the funda- 
mental cravings of her nature. This is the history of 
thousands of women whose husbands serve with the 
armies in the field. 

Of the seriousness of this situation there can be no 
doubt. Hundreds of soldiers have returned on leave to 
their homes to find their wives gone, depraved, diseased, 
or the mothers of illegitimate children. The law courts, 
temperance societies, and all social agencies have been 
forced to take cognizance of the deplorable situation. 
Case after case has been brought to public notice until 
the list runs into the thousands. A corporal, who was 
declared by his officer to be the best type of soldier, came 
home from the Somme to spend Christmas with his 
family, and when he found the public house had caused 
the ruin of his wife he committed murder ; and in pro- 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 21 

nouncing sentence the judge declared from the bench 
that "such a man, with such a character, ought not to 
be with criminals." "You should make trenches be- 
tween our homes and the public house," exclaimed a 
young soldier to a Member of Parliament who had 
urged his enlistment under promise that his family 
would be cared for. Another man, returning from the 
trenches, found that his wife had committed suicide, 
preferring death to facing her husband after her shame, 
leaving three children, including one just born, to break 
to their father the news of their mother's infidelity. 
Such happenings are so common that they are now 
scarcely exceptional; the tragic tales are told daily in 
the press and before the courts. So common, indeed, 
have they become that the British courts, for the first 
time in history, have recognized what in America is 
called "the unwritten law." 

It must not, however, be supposed that the wrong is 
confined exclusively to the women left at home, for the 
men have done their share in bringing about the condi- 
tion. I was told on good authority, by one who pro- 
fessed to know and who had every opportunity of know- 
ing, that there had been more than ten thousand proven 
cases of bigamy among the overseas troops of the Brit- 
ish Empire, and that the government was endeavoring 
to solve the difficult problem thus presented. I was one 
day approached by an officer in great distress of mind, 
because, having been summoned to testify regarding the 
suicide of a. brother officer, he faced the necessity of 
perjuring himself or bearing a witness which would dis- 



22 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

grace the memory and family of his friend. The truth 
was that the man had married a second wife in France 
and, ahout to he discharged from the army, committed, 
suicide to avoid the revelations which would inevitably 
follow his return to civil life. I have personal knowl- 
edge, also, of a case in which an officer attempted to 
marry a French girl; the girl, however, took the pre- 
caution of writing the mayor of the man's home town, 
and she received the intelligence that her suitor had a 
wife and children back at home. 

On another occasion I talked with a young woman 
who had been placed in a difficult situation. Her hus- 
band was an officer, the son of a wealthy English fam- 
ily, and when he returned from the front on leave he 
spent all of his time with another woman and openly 
refused to have further relations with his young wife. 
The result was that his family promised her a liberal 
allowance if she would go to London with one of the 
children and give the other to the mother-in-law. With- 
in a few months she was notified that the allowance 
would be reduced to a point which made it almost im- 
possible for her to live, and her protest brought infor- 
mation from a solicitor that the family were under no 
obligations to her, that her husband had nothing in his 
own right, and that she must either accept the reduc- 
tion or get nothing. It was evident that this action was 
preliminary to cutting her off entirely, and one could 
but be apprehensive of the result when such action 
should finally be taken. 

I know another case personally, sadder than either of 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 23 

these mentioned. The husband was in a venereal hos- 
pital, from which he went to his home regularly on 
visits. Because his wife refused to receive him inti- 
mately on account of his condition he placed the small 
child in a boarding school and withdrew all support 
from his wife, leaving her in London with nothing save 
the government allowance of one pound per week. In 
this case the man had long been carrying on improper 
relations with his wife's younger sister. 

The condition of which these cases are symptomatic 
seems to ramify through all classes of society. I have 
seen American officers and welfare workers with a large 
number of visiting cards bearing the names of women 
respectable in society, judging from their addresses, 
which had been given to them on trains, in the streets, 
and in motor busses, always with the suggestion of fur- 
ther acquaintanceship. I talked with the wife of a ma- 
jor in the British army, expressing my surprise at such 
a condition, and she said, in effect, "We are under such 
a strain that we have simply agreed to set aside our old 
conceptions. My own friends are doing things openly 
which would have caused their disgrace before the war. 
While the war continues we are seeing nothing and 
thinking nothing." 

In England the condition was brought prominently 
to the fore during the trial of Mr. Pemberton Billing, 
Member of Parliament, for libel, a trial which was a 
national scandal. Mr. Billing alleged that people of 
high estate were guilty of the most unspeakable ex- 
cesses, even mentioning in court the name of a former 



24 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

Prime Minister. It was declared that the Germans 
possessed a Black Book containing the names of 47,000 
prominent English people thus guilty, and that this in- 
formation was used by the enemy not only to further 
the demoralization of the social life of England but 
also to prevent activity on* the part of the people thus 
known. Over and over again Mr. Billing was de- 
nounced by the judge who was trying the case, and he 
in turn gave and offered testimony* showing that the 
judge's own name was in the Black Book. At the con- 
clusion of the disgraceful trial the jury quickly acquit- 
ted the defendant, thus proving that they believed the 
story of the Book, to the great joy of the hangers-on. 

As an aftermath of this trial the journal John Bull, 
a very popular and influential weekly which possesses, 
however, little to commend it to the conservative or con- 
structive forces of the Empire, made these remarks: 
"For years past there have been persistent and never 
to be stifled whispers and rumors of the prevalence of 
these sexual vices — on the part of both sexes — amongst 
all the higher ranks of society. Artists, authors, poli- 
ticians, musicians, actors, actresses, the clergy — all have 
contributed their quota to the volume of evil report. Go 
into any West End club, into any theatrical group, into 
any artistic coterie, or any political social gathering — 
where men and women are free to speak — and you hear 
the same names repeated. Go to any week-end party at 
a country house, and you find the same scientific selec- 
tion and grouping of guests. Before the war the Thing 
was bad enough — to-day it is infinitely worse. So far 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 25 

as women are concerned, the absence of their men at 
the front has undoubtedly aggravated the evil. On the 
other hand the nervous strain of the war and the idiotic 
talk about modern culture and all the rest of it, have 
had their effect upon the neurotic and erotic tempera- 
ments of men blase with the ordinary attractions of 
life — with the result that to-day sexual perversity is 
more rife than ever it has been before. It is no part 
of my intention recklessly to pillory the principal de- 
votees of these devilish arts — but I solemnly warn them 
that unless they take the hint given by recent events 
and disown and discard their abnormal practices, no 
consideration of either fear or convention will restrain 
me from publishing a Black Book of my own. I do not 
say it will contain forty-seven thousand names, but 
there are certainly forty-seven — known to every man 
and woman about town — the publication of which would 
shake the foundations of society. They include those 
of peers and their sons and daughters, of politicians and 
their wives, of actors and actresses, of authors and ar- 
tists, of clerics and ministers — 'established' and non- 
conformist — all famous in their respective spheres, and 
all at present protected by that weird free-masonry 
which is the gospel and moral of sexual perversity." 

That a vast deal of the immorality prevalent in Eng- 
land and France comes from Germany is the belief of 
thousands of those who are well versed in the methods 
of the enemy. "Le Vice Allemand," it is called. That 
such evil was prevalent in Germany to a horrid extent 
even before the war is well known, and since the out- 



26 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

break of hostilities the world has heard the most atro- 
cious rumors of what was happening in the social life 
of the enemy country — of how women were used like 
beasts for the propagation of the race, of how it became 
the acme of patriotic achievement for even girls "to 
present a future soldier to the emperor," of how men 
were instructed in regard to their social duty when sent 
away from the front on leave or discharged on account 
of wounds. The record of the Boche in Belgium and 
northern France and Poland bears witness to the fact 
that his militarism had bred viciousness in its worst 
form and corrupted an entire people. And there seems 
little cause to doubt that the wave of immorality in al- 
lied countries is at least aided and abetted by enemy 
spies. Thousands of the refugees are declared to be no 
refugees in the proper sense of the word, but common 
prostitutes sent by the enemy from Alsace, Lorraine, 
everywhere, to spread destruction in the social order 
and worm secrets from the people of allied lands. 

The fact that such a belief had been gaining adher- 
ents explains something of the anger of the people at 
the revelations made in the case of Pemberton Billing. 
Some of those whose names were mentioned had con- 
ducted affairs of state in a manner very displeasing to 
the people who were anxious "to get on with the war" ; 
they had refused to undertake a policy of reprisals in 
the matter of air raids, to intern all enemy aliens, to 
make cotton contraband, to stop the flow of German 
reservists from America to Germany, to adopt a more 
positive military policy than that of "wait and see." 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 2Tt 

There was, therefore, a storm of indignation when it 
was openly declared that some of those thus lax figured 
in the notorious Black Book. Could it be that the en- 
emy was blackmailing influential men into inactivity 
by virtue of a loathsome knowledge possessed about 
them? "How can it be wondered," asks John Bull, 
"that ordinary citizens — what the superior folk call the 
'common people' — believe that German influence has 
been at work ? One mistake — two mistakes — of policy ; 
one blunder — ten blunders — favoring Germany, might 
be put down to ignorance. No government is fool-proof, 
but deliberate acts, defended often with venom, justified 
with heat, the critics either derided or denounced — 
which have all helped the enemy and crippled us in the 
war — need some other explanation than stupidity — and 
God knows we have seen enough of that since August, 
1914! The crowds that seethed about the Old Bailey 
the other day believed that one secret of much of this 
cruel incompetence and wicked weakness and inaction 
which until recently clogged the wheels of war is to be 
found in that Black Book, and the jury — despite every 
rule of law — accepted fully the story told them. 

"If the Hun was content to wallow in his own filth, 
to sink in the bog of his own bestiality, we might de- 
plore the decadence of a race never noted for moral 
strength and cleanliness. But there is a greater danger, 
and it is one against which this country must fight with 
all its might — the danger of contamination from crea- 
tures like Bertha Trost — the woman of unspeakable 
practices, who was kicked out of this country after war 



28 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

had run some months its course, and who used her 
house not only to corrupt some of the best manhood of 
England, but to play the spy for Germany. There is 
enough evidence to convict our foul enemy of deliber- 
ately using men and women for the fell purpose of de- 
moralizing those who might from their position fall an 
easy prey to the careful inquisitiveness of those agents 
of the Hun. !Not only in the west end of London 
have these degenerate harpies designed their lairs, but 
in the big seaports of the country depraved women have 
been used by the Kaiser and his tools to worm the se- 
crets out of men and make them play traitor to their 
King and country. If ever there was a nation of des- 
picable creatures who subscribe to the gospel that 'the 
end justifies the means,' Germany is that nation. With- 
out common decency, ignorant of the meaning of 
honor, corrupt and corrupting, these skunks of Europe 
have played their loathsome game to the end that the 
purity of civilized communities might be defiled and 
honest men turned into miserable moral lepers. If the 
true story of the plots and schemes leading up to, and 
continuing during, the war is ever told, it will be found 
that decent men — yes, and women, too — have been art- 
fully enmeshed in the toils of lasciviousness, shackled 
in chains of unnatural vice, and held in bondage by the 
terror of their own evil doings." 

The realization that the enemy could thus intrigue to 
destroy even personal purity among the civilian popula- 
tion was responsible for a new outburst of hatred. 
"They have turned unnatural vice into a religion; they 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 29 

have their ritual for wrong doing and their orders of 
service for the most debased and bestial of practices. 
Among all decent men — in any society where chastity 
is given honorable recognition, where the purity of 
young manhood and the virtue of women is counted a 
priceless possession — the things which are spoken of in 
Germany with devilish arrogance and inhuman pride 
are only recognized in asylums for the insane, in re- 
treats for the mentally debased. Would it be believed 
that in the land of the Hun they would alter the very 
laws which bring to punishment those who debase phys- 
ical purity, and one of their most famous, or infamous, 
authors pleads for toleration of the most unspeakable 
crimes against naturehood, and contemplates the time 
when his false and perverted view shall have 'permeated 
the wide circles of the population' and when 'the old con- 
sciousness of right will be replaced by the new one, 
which will demand the repeal of a criminal law by 
which a natural phenomenon is regarded as a vice and 
is treated as infamous'? How can any decent man 
boast of finding a 'spiritual home' in this land of male 
perverts and female decadents? The time will come 
when the morally weak, and those whose patriotism is 
thin and anemic, will ask the manhood of Great Brit- 
ain to make friends with the nation of moral lepers. 
In God's name, let us keep our heads — aye, and en- 
deavor by every means in our power to keep free from 
the contaminating touch of the Hun." 

Thus far has social looseness gone in England; thus 
far has it been recognized by a saddened people. Not 



SO SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

only is London thus affected, but the blight has spread 
to most of the cities and towns of the United Kingdom 
— Liverpool is the worst of all. And the same condi- 
tions obtain in the other nations; in the degree of bad- 
ness I would arrange them thus: England, France, 
Italy, Scotland, Ireland. The nations have realized the 
necessity of some corrective measures but have been 
powerless to devise them. A proposition was made to 
place the wives of soldiers under control, but it was 
dropped because of the reflection which such an act 
would inevitably cast upon the families of the men giv- 
ing their lives for the country. 

There is another phase to the subject in connection 
with the causes for the carnival of crime ; it is found in 
the lack of restraint on the part of the womanhood of 
the lands towards the soldiers. At its heart this is 
founded upon a noble sentiment and has been encour- 
aged in many ways. Europe loves her soldiers. She 
will make any sacrifice for their comfort. The women 
have vied with one another in their efforts to entertain 
them and contribute to their well being. The best homes 
are opened to them and they are wined and dined con- 
tinuously. Each woman and girl seems to consider her- 
self a committee of one to do something for a soldier. 
Thus the restraint which in ordinary times hedges the 
freedom of association between the women and the men 
has been thrown aside. And beyond question this has 
contributed something to the ruin of the girls and the 
seriousness of the social evil. 

Now if this is the actual state of affairs in the bel- 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 31 

ligerent countries, we might expect that superhuman ef- 
forts would be put forth to stem the tide of immorality 
and save the people. Yet the exact reverse is true. So 
far as the ordinary person is able to discover, there is 
absolutely no action being taken to control the evil. The 
laws, of course, stand on the statute books and we oc- 
casionally read of a conviction, but all this means noth- 
ing but a small fine, perhaps a brief imprisonment, 
notoriety through the public press, and then the victim 
is sent out worse than ever, hardened, resentful, and 
with the door of reformation effectually closed against 
her. The difficulties in such a situation are well known 
and are the same in all countries: the difficulty of se- 
curing evidence, the lack of any adequate corrective 
agencies, the general attitude which prevents reforma- 
tion, and the inability to grapple with the evil at its 
base by reaching the ultimate cause of it. 

To speak of the problem which such a reign of im- 
morality is preparing for the future is to raise at once 
the entire range of social questions. There is no form 
of crime which ramifies so thoroughly through the struc- 
ture of a people's life as the social evil, and the present 
carnival of misbehavior, which I am constrained to be- 
lieve rivals any similar situation which has ever faced 
the world in its history, is piling up for us trouble of a 
most serious kind. In the first place, we shall have to 
consider anew the question of illegitimacy, and this will 
involve a complete change of attitude toward unfortu- 
nate children if it is to be answered in a way that will 
preserve the best interests of the social order. It will 



32 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

require more than a mere official edict or legal enact- 
ment ordering the legitimatizing of all children born out 
of wedlock; this, indeed, is a foolish proceeding, since 
it secures to the children nothing which they would not 
obtain without it except in unusual cases. The remedy 
must go deeper ; it must secure to such children all the 
benefits of opportunity and respect, and this cannot be 
done until the attitude of society, which denies them 
these things, is changed. And this is the most difficult of 
all tasks, as well as the most dangerous. Deep seated 
prejudices, moral conceptions with centuries of time 
behind them, ideas of respectability which are the out- 
growth of the social experience of all ages, the instinc- 
tive sentiments of the heart to which violations of con- 
jugal confidence are repulsive — no law or edict can 
change these things. And what if they are changed? 
In that case we face the danger of plunging the world 
into a very hell of crime by overthrowing all of its 
moral ideas. Surely the best interests of civilization 
will not be served by the cultivation of a spirit which ex- 
cuses illegitimacy and looks with toleration upon the 
violation of the seventh commandment ! For such a re- 
laxation could not be a temporary expedient ; our ideas 
are too fundamental to be changed and adjusted at will. 
In either case the social problem remains serious. 

Another aspect of this social problem will concern 
the preponderance in the number of the women over the 
men. This is a favorite subject of speculation, and the 
superficial suggestions for its adjustment range all the 
way from "equal rights for women," through polygamy, 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 33 

to the complete abolition of the institution of marriage. 
But it is not nearly so serious as it has been pictured. 
Its economic aspects are, indeed, practically negligible. 
In this war the women have shown once for all that they 
are abundantly able and willing to take care of them- 
selves, so that their dependence upon the opposite sex 
for support is a thing of the past. In the matter of 
morality and the welfare of the home as an institution, 
however, the influence of the disparity of one sex will be 
felt. It will not be a good thing, either for the women 
or for the world, to throw the women into industry by 
the side of men, giving them the same wages and oifer- 
ing them all inducements to become cogs in the ma- 
chine of industry. That thousands of them are forced 
to turn their activities into this channel is quite true, 
and in such cases simple justice demands that they be 
not discriminated against. But the well-worn argu- 
ment that "woman's place is in the home," however 
much it may be ridiculed by the radicals, is after all 
founded upon the most fundamental conception of our 
social life. Whatever adjustments we may be forced 
to make out of necessity, the fact will remain that the 
ideal life for the woman is in the home ; from this stand- 
point we will digress at our peril. Now the prepon- 
derance of women over the men will necessarily force 
us to make a wide digression from this ideal. Many 
thousands seem to be barred from the home life to 
which they are attracted by instinct and by training. 
But an industrial occupation cannot change human na- 
ture nor eradicate the deepest instincts of the life, while 



34 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

the association and competition with men on a common 
basis will neither give the men a deeper respect for the 
women nor strengthen their moral conscience. Hence 
it seems certain that immorality will resnlt from the 
new situation. 

The world is also threatened with having its confi- 
dence in and respect for the women undermined. It is 
already apparent that the men of Europe have really less 
respect for their women than they had before the be- 
ginning of hostilities. They are very proud of the won- 
derful things the women have done, and of this they 
may well be proud, but these achievements have not 
deepened their respect — perhaps it would be better to say 
that they have given them a different kind of respect. 
But whether the difference be in kind or degree, it seems 
plain that the women do not occupy such an exalted 
place in the moral estimate of the men as they once 
held. This has been caused, or accompanied, by a de- 
cline in the tone of the women. Their familiar asso- 
ciation with the men, the profligate use of cigarettes, 
which the war has so heightened that it seems well-nigh 
universal, the masculinity which comes from doing the 
work of men, the increasing carelessness in the mat- 
ter of personal appearance — these are the things about 
which the men are complaining. Then in connection 
with this there is the awful deluge of vice which has 
degraded so many thousands and resulted in so much 
disease. This situation has undoubtedly caused people 
to lose confidence in each other. There is a confusion 
of mind which partakes of doubt and suspicion. Men 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 35 

do not know whether to trust the women, and women do 
not know whether to trust the men. And so this subtle 
attitude, which really fastens suspicion upon every- 
body, is another element in the social problem of the fu- 
ture. It will prevent reformation, cause more immo- 
rality, hinder marriage, and threaten the free and 
righteous relations of the people. 

It will be seen at once that all of these phases of the 
situation drive straight at the home. And this is the 
most serious element in it. To destroy or even to seri- 
ously injure the home is more dangerous than to have 
the immorality, the disease, and the illegitimacy 
amongst us ; and when we have the immorality, the dis- 
ease, and the illegitimacy present with us and combined 
in an attack upon the hpme, then the situation is peril- 
ous in the extreme. And that is exactly the case at the 
present time. The most discerning minds among us 
have known for many years that we were drifting into 
a state of being which was gradually assailing the home. 
The drift of population to the cities, the laxity of our 
laws concerning divorce, the forcing of our women into 
industry, their oppression by the capitalists, the modern 
feminist movement with its "votes for women" slogan — 
each of these things has struck a blow at the home. Then 
came that immoral phase of socialism which openly ad- 
vocated the theory of the home's dissolution and urged 
the repeal of our notions concerning marriage. These 
things caused many people to be exceedingly anxious. 
If matters continued for a few more years in the same 
channel, and at the same rate of progress, soon there 



36 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

would be no home; and since no substitute bad been 
provided and nothing bad been done to meet a situa- 
tion that was threatening to dethrone all our morality 
and place the world in a condition which moral senti- 
ment had always regarded as the extreme of corruption, 
there was ample cause for alarm. And now on top of 
all that there comes this war and brings with it a social 
problem at least as serious as any the world has ever 
faced before, a problem having all the various phases we 
have mentioned, with each phase leveling its attack at 
what was left of the home. If there lives a man whose 
highest hope for the future welfare of the world lies in 
the moral stability of the home, he must now be weep- 
ing his heart out over the danger which threatens this 
ancient and holy institution. And it will behoove him 
to bestir himself for a solution which will avert such 
danger. 

One naturally turns to the Church for something of 
promise in such a crisis, and in this he follows a right 
instinct ; for the Church is the only purely moral insti- 
tution on earth, and it stands for nothing save the pres- 
ervation of moral values ; the home has always been its 
hobby, and rightly so. Therefore if the Church is not 
prepared to offer help in such a situation as that which 
prevails in Europe at the present time, we would be at 
a loss to know where to turn. But when one asks the 
European Church of the present day for light in this 
moral crisis, he meets the disappointment of his life. 
For the Church has no light; she is not seeking any 
light ; she seems blissfully ignorant of the fact that any 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 37 

light is needed. If she has any, it is snugly hid under 
the bushel of a smug self-satisfaction and the hollowest 
sort of a simulated patriotism which is in itself a sham. 
Surely these are the saddest days that the modern 
Church ever fell upon. She preaches enlistment and sets 
her holy sanction on the crudest war of history. She 
stirs up the passions of the people to fight and hates her 
own members who urge conscientious objections to bear- 
ing arms. Her pulpits ring with bitter denunciations 
of sin, but it is always German sin. She pictures the 
coming of a golden era, but according to the will of 
God, that era must be achieved by blood and battle. On 
these things the Church is a unit, and if there is a dis- 
senter his voice is too puny to be heard. For once at 
least, the European Church has found something upon 
which it can unite. 

And all the while vice of the most repulsive sort 
flaunts itself before the very doors of the Church, cor- 
rupting the morals of the people, perverting all the 
righteous conceptions which hold together the social 
fabric, and nullifying both the message and activity of 
the Church. It is so flagrant that its presence cannot 
be unnoticed, even by the most innocent. The Sunday 
School children and the clergymen are brought into 
contact with it if they walk the streets or possess any 
knowledge of current events. And yet the Church says 
little and does less. The clergy seem to think that it 
would be treason to the state to suggest that England is 
corrupt ; to let it be known that England is rotten to the 
core and does not care, would be giving aid and com- 



y 



38 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

fort to the enemy. And so patriotism of the sort which 
consists wholly in hating the national enemy, rather 
than in seeking the purification of the motherland, holds 
sway. The Church still "practices respectability and 
calls it holiness," and she keeps herself respectable by 
turning her face away from horrid immoralities. It is 
like the ostrich escaping danger by hiding his head in 
the sand. 

At the beginning of the war, so it is said, Mr. H. G. 
Wells spent his time in the yard of a village Church, 
overwhelmed by the calamity which had overtaken the 
world, and lost in thought. He reflected that one of 
these Churches stood in each hamlet and settlement of 
the civilized world, and that no living person in these 
lands was beyond its influence. He knew that the 
Church stood upon the platform of Christ, urging love 
and goodness as against hate and violence, and that 
upon this platform it had come to be the most respected, 
the richest, and the most influential of all human forces. 
Then the question came upon him with crushing vio- 
lence : Why has there not gone out from this institution 
an influence which would make this war impossible? 
And because he could not answer this question Mr. 
Wells, converted by the war into a man keenly alive to 
the spiritual realities of the universe, became confused 
in his thinking, and has conjured up a kind of religion 
which even he does not understand and which offers 
nothing to the world. 

And when we contemplate the situation of the world 
in regard to the problem of vice, we are forced into the 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 39 

same position in which Mr. Wells found himself. Why 
is it that the Church, with all its influence, power, mo- 
rality, and respectability, has done nothing whatever in 
checking this evil? It is a strange thing to contem- 
plate, that after the Church has been operating twenty 
centuries this form of wickedness is just as wide-spread 
and flagrant as it has ever been. It has been more re- 
pulsive, perhaps, but I doubt if there ever has been a 
moment in history when it was more common than at the 
present moment. Can it be that our ideas are wrong? 
Are we disapproving of a thing which is such a funda- 
mental element of human nature that it cannot be 
eradicated, and must we admit our mistake and reform 
our morality so as to leave room for indiscriminate 
licentiousness? There are those who so think, and it 
seems that we must either adopt this attitude, or else be- 
stir ourselves to the application of our morality with 
greater care to the solution of this age-long problem. 

We will not easily believe that our ideas are wrong, 
but we must confess that we have hopelessly failed in 
applying Christianity to the problem before us. And 
Christianity has failed here for the same reason that it 
has failed in other departments of life — simply because 
it has never been tried. Let us frankly admit that the 
Church has never tried to solve the question of social 
vice; she has not created any paraphernalia, she has 
not educated her people, she has not even preached upon 
the subject. In her way, there have been and still are 
mighty obstacles which she has not been able to sur- 
mount. And yet most of these obstacles are of her own 



40 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

making and the task of unmaking them will be as diffi- 
cult as the surmounting. But it must be done. Here is 
one of the clearest challenges which the Church hears, 
and in responding she will come to one of the most diffi- 
cult tasks she ever attempted. She must bestir herself, 
and she must do it immediately ; else the tidal wave of 
immorality which the war has set in motion will en- 
gulf us. 

One of the greatest difficulties between the Church 
and her task has been her inability to obtain access to 
the people she would help. It is quite true that the 
Church has made little attempt in this direction, but her 
reticence has been caused largely by the knowledge that 
a deep gulf, almost impassable, stretches between her 
and the denizens of the underworld. How could this be 
bridged? Street preaching, home missionaries, rescue 
schemes, have all failed, and even now we know no way 
by which a minister or any other religious worker can 
get in personal touch with depraved women in such a 
manner as to impress them with the sense of their sin. 
And this situation has been rendered more difficult by 
the type of persons who have takeri upon themselves the 
task of such work. Usually they have been men or 
women of limited intellectual ability and with absolute- 
ly no grasp upon the details of their work; they have 
gone into the slums with a sentimental evangelistic mes- 
sage and have endeavored to convert the wayward out 
of hand. But they have had no conception of the social 
problem involved, and have been completely baffled at 
the first question, "Then what shall become of us ?" If 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 41 

the underworld is to be evangelized, men and women 
of the very highest attainments, intellectually and spirit- 
ually, must take the task in hand. 

And at the outset, the Church must find some answer 
to return to the question, "Then what shall become of 
us?" The saddest fact in connection with the whole 
problem is that the sinful are practically barred from 
reforming and taking their places in a respectable so- 
ciety. This is the point to which immediate attention 
must be paid. We have no homes, no schools, and no 
other agencies to which these people can be taken and 
where they can be rehabilitated. And the situation 
would be bettered but little even if we had such agen- 
cies. To be known as the inmate of such an institution 
is as bad as to be known as a courtesan, and it is a true 
instinct which prompts most women to avoid them. 
What is needed is a different attitude on the part of 
society toward the unfortunate. Let us realize at once 
that the trouble is not all on the side of the sinner. 
They will reform in large numbers the moment we make 
up our minds to let them reform. The present attitude 
of society is the thing that keeps them in the immoral 
life, for it denies them employment, opportunity and 
respectability. How, then, can they reform ? 

Let us imagine what would happen in the average 
Church if a woman known to be a prostitute should 
prostrate herself at the altar and confess her sins, seek- 
ing and obtaining salvation in the way taught by the 
Church. Then what ? Could she take her place in the 
pew as a member of the Church on a level with the other 



42 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

Christians, say, on the level of the man who was re- 
sponsible for her ruin ? We all know she could not. If 
the pastor introduced her to his ladies' society she would 
he either spurned or treated with such reserve that life 
would he made unbearable. Not a woman in the con- 
gregation would give her employment in the home or as- 
sociate with her upon terms of equality. No man would 
care to seek her company, unless indeed he were seeking 
to drag her down again. Such a woman would have ab- 
solutely no hope because the Christian people in the 
Church would allow her none. And at the same time 
the man who had been responsible for her defection 
might associate with the best people of the community at 
his pleasure. The only chance for a reforming sinner, 
if she be a woman, is to live a life of deception, to hide 
her past from all the world; and this means to live in 
constant dread and haunted by a sense of her own hypoc- 
risy. In this state there can be no true religion and 
no reformation. But the fault is not upon the sinner ; 
it rests at the door of the respectable people, those who 
profess to be followers of the Christ who said, "Neither 
do I condemn thee ; go and sin no more." 

The plea is made that such an attitude is necessary 
for the protection of society. We all know how care- 
fully a mother should guard her daughter and shield her 
from persons and influences that might cause her ruin. 
But is it really true that we prevent immorality by 
making one false step fatal ? We have notified our girls 
severely enough that if they go wrong they are doomed 
forever, but the notification has not checked the sin. It 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 43 

has only kept the. girls in it after they enter. If this at- 
titude is right, in Heaven's name, let it be applied im- 
partially to men and women alike. At a state legislature 
before which a bill for the establishment of a segregated 
vice district was pending there appeared a woman who 
caused the introduction of a similar bill applying to all 
men frequenting the district ; the men were to be segre- 
gated and subjected to all the restrictions which the bill 
ordered for the women. This was enough to prevent the 
enactment of the law. Yet there was no reason why one 
would not be as just and as safe as the other. 

It is a risky thing to advise the lowering of the stern 
attitude against fallen women, but since this attitude 
is the only thing that prevents reformation such advice 
must be given. This is not to say that the social evil 
must be regarded lightly. But it is to say that persons 
who have committed this sin have the same right of 
pardon as other sinners, and we have no moral justifica- 
tion for erecting a barrier against them. When thieves, 
murderers, and highwaymen are. allowed to repent and 
be respectable, we have no right to deny the privilege to 
the women who fall. They should be forced to prove 
their repentance by their works to be sure, but we must 
open the way for them to regain the place in society 
which they forfeited when they sinned. If we do not do 
this, then let us no longer claim to be the representa- 
tives of Christ on earth. For if the example of Christ 
teaches us anything, it surely is that women taken in sin 
have His utmost respect and sympathy and kindness. 

But how shall we protect our homes? There is but 



44 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

one way, and this is educational. The lack of proper 
training in home, and school, and Church on this sub- 
ject is a national disgrace to us, I have never heard a 
sermon on the subject. I have never known it to he 
mentioned to any children in the home. I know of no 
school that takes notice of it in the curriculum. We are 
leaving our young people to their own devices, letting 
them grow up in ignorance and gain all their informa- 
tion from the most vicious sources. And when we have 
thus dealt with them, we place the eternal brand of 
shame on their brows at the first false step. Then we 
wrap our sanctimonious cloak of respectability about 
ourselves and easa our consciences, as Pilate washed 
from his hands the. blood of Christ. And yet at our own 
door crouches the. sin. On our own shoulders rests the 
responsibility. At our own hands shall the blood of a 
thousand erring girls be required. 

Let the Church give some of the thcfught which she 
now expends upon foolish intricacies of theology to this 
practical and urgent problem of sin and salvation. Let 
her put some of her wealth into agencies which will in- 
sure kindness and helpfulness to the fallen. Her ora- 
tory ought to be brought to bear upon the text: "Let 
him who is without sin cast the first stone." Eevelation 
should claim less attention and Hosea more. Make it 
known that there is a gospel for those who fall, and that 
sympathy and comfort in the truest sense await such at 
the house of God. Let people who call themselves 
Christian display the spirit of Christ to those who are in 
truth their sisters. By laws and state regulation we 



IMMORALITY DURING THE WAR 45 

should protect our girls and exterminate the breed of 
men who speculate in their blood, either openly or 
through the medium of factories and department stores. 
Then give us, through home, school, and Church, the 
most comprehensive and far-reaching educational move- 
ment we have ever seen, so thorough that no child who 
reaches the age of understanding can escape its influ- 
ence. When we have, done all this, we will be in a fair 
way to grapple seriously with the social evil. 



CHAPTER II 

WHAT DOES IRELAND INTEND? 

Since all the statesmen, diplomats, and publicists of 
Europe have failed to arrive at a solution of the Irish 
question, and since Irishmen themselves are hopelessly 
divided on a matter with which they are perfectly fa- 
miliar and in which they are vitally concerned, it ap- 
pears presumptuous for a casual observer, and he a 
foreigner, to venture any word upon it. But even sur- 
face impressions have a certain value, especially if they 
are arrived at without any previous bias. An American 
is perhaps the only person, from that standpoint, who 
is qualified to speak, for strict impartiality in regard to 
Ireland scarcely exists anywhere in Europe. Men are 
either pro-Irish or anti-Irish, so much so that one must 
read with care any of the innumerable books and pam- 
phlets which are issued in regard to the problem. I sup- 
pose that more passion, prejudice, enmity, and misrep- 
resentation have come about in this connection than has 
been true of any problem which ever vexed the public 
affairs of the world. 

One of the surprising things in the war is the loyalty 
with which the colonies have risen to the defense of the 
British Empire. The self-governing dominions adopted 

46 



WHAT DOES IRELAND INTEND? 47 

conscription, if they needed it, in order to furnish a full 
quota of troops, and we have seen that Britain possessed 
a solidarity hitherto undreamed of. The southern prov- 
inces of Ireland have heen the only outstanding excep- 
tion to this rule; and the fact that opposition also de- 
veloped in the Catholic sections of Canada and Austra- 
lia serves only to make more prominent and regrettable 
the defection of these Irish. For this has emphasized 
the religious difficulty which rests at the base of the 
Irish question, and the result has heen to widen the 
breach already existing between the Protestant and 
Catholic elements in the population and to lay the Catho- 
lics open to the charges of treason and disloyalty. 

As an American sincerely attached to the principle 
that governments derive their just powers from the con- 
sent of the governed, as a democrat believing that the 
will of the majority should rule, and as a Protestant 
without prejudice against Eome or sympathy with anti- 
Catholic propaganda, I visited the various sections of 
Ireland for the purpose of obtaining first-hand informa- 
tion and personal impressions. And I came away with 
the opinion that the attitude of southern Irishmen at 
the present time is altogether impossible, deplorable, and 
unworthy. Their program, if carried into execution, 
will mean anarchy in the Emerald Isle, it will threaten 
the stability of the British Empire and all that is thus 
represented, it will mean a harking back for many 
generations in that section of the world, and it will ul- 
timately mean the ruination of Ireland. 

Sinn Eeinism controls the south, and has been able 



48 SOCIAL STUDIES OF L THE WAR 

to unseat the Nationalists in Parliament ; in their stead 
radicals have been elected who refused to take their 
seats, and even boasted in the campaigns that if elected 
they would ignore the Commons. The result is that the 
places at Westminster have been vacated, no one is at 
hand to care for Irish interests, and we have the spec- 
tacle of the south standing apart and raving over prob- 
lems which they refuse to assist in settling. But this 
is to the liking of Sinn Fein, and the great majority of 
the southern people honestly believe that by such a proc- 
ess they are destined to obtain the independence they 
crave. 

The most outstanding feature of the present situation 
is the ardency with which these people defend their posi- 
tion and the eagerness with which they seek to obtain 
support from Americans. The time-worn arguments 
against England, all of them arranged without any his- 
torical sense whatever, have been mastered by men and 
women of all classes, and the American passing through 
the island is besieged constantly by enthusiastic apolo- 
gists. On trains, in hotels, on the streets, in jaunting 
carts, he is beleaguered, the people encompassing the 
earth to make one proselyte to their cause. Members of 
Parliament and other dignitaries are everywhere met 
with, and their cordiality is always the precursor of the 
eternal question, "What do you think of England's 
treatment of Ireland V 9 The cart driver cannot take one 
three blocks until he inquires, "Why should we fight for 
England V 9 Loungers in hotel lobbies seek out the trav- 
eler to demand, "What does America think of the Irish 



rf%s 




Ggfg Ms- 



IRELAND &? CONSCRIPTION 

Unanimous !>ki.\k \ i ion of thi- Mansion Housf Conference 




T 



PROCLAMATIONS OF THE MANSION HOUSE CONFERENCE AND THE ROMAN 
CATHOLIC CHURCH URGING THE IRISH TO RESIST CONSCRIPTION 



WHAT DOES IRELAND INTEND? 49 

question V 9 Shop-keepers greet the American genially, 
and at once lead up to the query, "If Mr. Wilson believes 
in self-determination for small nationalities, will he not 
right our wrongs V 9 And so from one end of the country 
to another the poor wayfarer is sought, courted, cajoled, 
flattered, and fed on a diet of ancient argument which 
he has heard from his youth up. And a great propa- 
ganda machine is maintained to convince America that 
the Irish are friendly to the States, 

As to whether they really are friendly to us, one can 
only judge by events. The city of Cork has been placed 
"out of bounds" to American sailors because of the riots 
and brawls, resulting in actual bloodshed, which their 
presence in the city caused. Even at Queenstown I was 
informed that Americans riding bicycles along the roads 
had been stoned until they were forced to discontinue 
the exercise. "When I arrived at Cork I was met by a 
Y. M. C. A. secretary in civilian clothing who explained 
that he had discarded his uniform to avoid trouble ; in 
London I was even advised to lay aside my uniform be- 
fore venturing into Ireland. On one occasion several 
men in khaki, with U. S. on their collars, deemed it the 
part of wisdom to remain in the hotel during the even- 
ing and were subjected to taunts through the windows 
from the young Irishmen on the streets* A religious 
director of the Young Men's Christian Association told 
me that he had been attacked on the street, and soon his 
story was verified in my own experience. 

I reached Cork one evening when the atmosphere was 
surcharged with the spirit of rebellion. A great Sinn 



50 SOCIAL STUDIES OF [THE WAR 

Fein street meeting had been scheduled as a demonstra- 
tion against England, a large speakers' platform had 
been erected in the Grand Parade, and the young Irish- 
men had nocked in from the surrounding country to par- 
ticipate in the anti-English seance. The meeting had, 
however, been dissolved by order of the commander of 
the British garrison, the streets were guarded by con- 
stables with carbines, and the soldiers were patrolling 
with fixed bayonets; everywhere were groups of Sinn 
Eeiners, sullen, angry, muttering under their breath. 
As I passed as quietly as possible down the street I could 
hear remarks issuing from the various knots of young- 
sters: "There is a damned Yankee," "damned Ameri- 
can," and the like. Suddenly a man emerged from a 
group, lifted a small cane, and struck me violently across 
the face, while his action was greeted by roars and 
shouts of laughter from his compatriots. 

These actions indicate that the love of Sinn Fein for 
our country is not so wholehearted as it might be, and 
yet it would be an injustice to say that they are repre- 
sentative of the general sentiment prevailing among the 
more stable citizenship. At heart these people under- 
stand that they have no friends among the Allies except 
America, and for the most part they are anxious to cul- 
tivate this friendship for ulterior reasons; but their 
hatred of England is so deep, their desire to see her hu- 
miliated so intense, that among the young Irishmen, who 
constitute the strength of Sinn Fein, it often expresses 
itself in hostility towards all those who are assisting in 



WHAT DOES IRELAND INTEND? 51 

saving England from the defeat which is so cordially 
wished her. 

That this element is pro-German and traitorous to the 
cause for which we contended there can be little doubt. 
The British Government has apprehended them in many 
plots with the enemy, and it is a matter of common con- 
versation on the streets of Irish towns that the German 
submarines are making regular attempts to land ammu- 
nition and machine guns on Irish soil. Although I have 
tried repeatedly, I was never once able to induce a Sinn 
Feiner, or any other southerner, for that matter, to 
speak one word in condemnation of Germany. When 
in the midst of vehement strictures against England I 
have injected the question, " Would you prefer the dom- 
ination of Germany V 9 the result has been a quiet and 
hesitating "]5To," or a total silence; in either case the 
speaker refused to discuss the matter. Certain of them, 
however, have gone so far as to declare that "German 
rule could be no worse than English at any rate." 

This attitude of mind prevailing everywhere in the 
south, while it can hardly be explained, creates a dis- 
tinct atmosphere of hostility which can be felt most un- 
comfortably by the pro-ally traveler. It is constantly 
impressed upon him that there is something wrong with 
this country, that sedition and rebellion are in the very 
air, that respect for law and order has reached a low 
ebb. It is, of course, a matter of common knowledge 
that Sinn Eein is bending heaven and earth to arm it- 
self, in spite of the law against drilling and keeping 
arms. Burglary always follows a report that a citizen 



52 SOCIAL STUDIES OF [THE WAR 

has a rifle or pistol in his house, and from the British 
garrison on Bere Island, as well as from the American 
submarine base and kite balloon station at Castletown 
Bere, the signal rockets and lights can be seen issu- 
ing from the hills as Sinn Fein calls her devotees to- 
gether or flashes communications to enemy submarines. 
One day I was standing on the pier at Castletown Bere 
when a man wearing a green hat appeared ; the hangers- 
on greeted him warmly and he remarked, "Remember 
the: green, Friday night" ; whereupon his hearers all sa- 
luted respectfully and the man rode away on a bicycle. 
The incident was significant of the plans and the organi- 
zation of Sinn Fein in this remote section of Ireland. 
When the present war broke out there were, of course, 
a large number of Irishmen who desired heartily to see 
England decisively defeated and humbled, and they saw 
in such a possibility the "liberation" of their island. 
Germany believed that Ireland was ripe for a rebellion 
and her propaganda was set to work in an effort to hasten 
that event, an effort which bore abundant fruit in the 
Easter rebellion. This fiasco settled, and in a manner 
by no means as harsh as the Irish agitators would have 
us believe, England was in a position to control the 
turbulent people if she had been able to adopt a definite 
and firm Irish policy. But as a matter of fact England 
had no Irish policy, and has never had. By using pa- 
cific methods with a people who have always refused to 
be pacified, she permitted, and even encouraged, the for- 
mation of other plots and the general dissatisfaction of 
the population. The Irish constantly complain against 



WHAT DOES IRELAND INTEND? 53 

the cruelty of England and the oppression to which they 
are su ejected at the hands of that power, but most 
disinterested people who visit Ireland are almost amazed 
at the laxity of her administration of the Defense of the 
Eealm acts and at the insults and seditious encourage- 
ments which she tolerates. When we in easy-going and 
tolerant America were arresting men for remarking that 
the Eed Cross was a "fake," England was permit- 
ting Irish people and newspapers to call the flag a 
'"floor-mat," stage giant demonstrations against the 
Empire and the war, and talk openly in severe denun- 
ciation of the government of which they are a part, even 
to the limit of declaring in open parliament that a re- 
bellion would be advised if the leaders could persuade 
themselves that it would be successful. In the Grand 
Parade in Cork there stands a great monument bearing 
the names of "the martyr vanguard," mostly men who 
have been executed for treason, and an inscription urg- 
ing young Irishmen to follow their example ; and in the 
great Dublin cemetery one of the epitaphs reads thus: 
"I have been adjudged guilty of treason. Treason is a 
foul crime. Dante places traitors in the ninth circle of 
hell, I believe the lowest circle. But what kind of trai- 
tors are these ? Traitors against country, kindred, and 
benefactors. But England is not my country and I have 
betrayed no friend. I leave the matter there." I doubt 
if there is a land on earth where such open sedition 
would be tolerated as is carried on daily in Ireland. 

Great Britain believes that Ireland would be pacified 
somewhat if she were placed on the footing with other 



54 SOCIAL STUDIES OF [THE WAR 

self-governing dominions, and thus the home rule and 
conscription bills were prepared. But the result was an 
explosion more violent than any that had occurred 
hitherto. Sinn Fein did not desire and would not have 
Home Rule, Ulster of course set her face against it, and 
conscription was opposed like the plague. All over the 
south the anger of the people waxed hot, and that section 
became a seething caldron of disaffection and sedition. 
The population resolved to resist unto the last limit, and 
they pledged themselves, men and women alike, to op- 
pose conscription by all the means at their disposal. 
Anti-conscription pledges were signed everywhere, hun- 
dreds of thousands affixing their signatures and display- 
ing the little white buttons on their lapels as a token 
of their resistance. There were meetings, committees, 
plots, and movements in every city, town, and village to 
crystallize sentiment and weld together the opposition. 
The observer could not escape the knowledge that south- 
ern Ireland would have nothing to do with the war or 
allow the people to be conscripted. The young men of 
military age swarmed the streets of the larger towns by 
multiplied thousands, showing by their very numbers 
what Ireland could do in the way of supplying man 
power to the armies if she only would. 

And now for the first time the Church came openly to 
the front and assumed the leadership of the anti-British 
crusade. The Church, as is well known, had always been 
behind the sentiment against the Empire, but hitherto 
her influence had been more or less veiled ; now it is open 
and avowed. The priests head the committees, issue the 



WHAT DOES IRELAND INTEND? 55 

propaganda literature, handle the funds of rebellion, 
make the political speeches, and influence the people to 
sign the anti-conscription pledges. These pledges are 
always signed in the Churches after special masses, and 
in each town there are great posters urging the people 
to attend the masses and sign the pledges. This is the 
text of the pledge and the inscription on the buttons: 
"Denying the right of the British Government to enforce 
compulsory service in this country, we pledge ourselves 
solemnly to one another to resist Conscription by the 
most effective means at our disposal. 5 ' The women wear 
buttons which pledge them to refuse to take the place of 
any person conscripted and to assist the families of those 
who may suffer through resistance. 

The hierarchy made the following pronouncement, 
which was signed by Cardinal Logue and all the bishops 
and archbishops of Ireland: "The Bishops direct the 
clergy to celebrate a public Mass of intercession on next 
Sunday in every Church in Ireland to avert the scourge 
of conscription with which Ireland is now threatened. 
They further direct that an announcement be made at 
every public Mass on Sunday next of a public meeting 
to be held on that day at an hour and place to be speci- 
fied in the announcement, for the purpose of administer- 
ing the following pledge against compulsory conscription 
in Ireland: 'Denying the right of the British Govern- 
ment to enforce compulsory service in this country, we 
pledge ourselves solemnly to one another to resist con- 
scription by the most effective means at our disposal.' 
The clergy are also requested by the Bishops to announce 



56 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

on Sunday next that a collection will be held at an early 
suitable date outside the Church gates for the purpose of 
supplying means to resist the imposition of compulsory 
military service. 

"An attempt is being made to force conscription upon 
Ireland against the will of the Irish nation and in de- 
fiance of the protests of its leaders. In view especially 
of the historic relations between the two countries from 
the very beginning up to the present moment, we con- 
sider that conscription forced in this way upon Ireland 
is an oppressive and inhuman law, which the Irish peo- 
ple have a right to resist by all the means that are con- 
sonant with the law of God. We wish to remind our 
people that there is a higher Power which controls the 
affairs of men. They have in their hands the means 
of conciliating that Power by strict adherence to the 
Divine law, by more earnest attention to their religious 
duties, and by fervent and persevering prayer. In order 
to secure the aid of the Holy Mother of God, who 
shielded our people in the days of their greatest trials, 
we have already sanctioned a National Novena in hon- 
or of Our Lady of Lourdes, commencing on the 3rd 
May, to secure general and domestic peace. We also 
exhort the heads of families to have the Rosary recited 
every evening with the intention of protecting the spir- 
itual and temporal welfare of our beloved country, and 
bringing us safely through this crisis of unparalleled 
gravity." 

This action on the part of the hierarchy followed the 
famous Mansion House Conference, attended by Irish 



WHAT DOES IRELAND INTEND? 51 

leaders and Members of Parliament and presided over by 
the Lord Mayor of Dublin. This Conference started the 
opposition to conscription by issuing the following state- 
ment : "Taking our stand on Ireland's separate and dis- 
tinct nationhood, and affirming the principle of liberty, 
that Governments of nations derive their just powers 
from the consent of the governed, we deny the right of 
the British Government or any external authority to im- 
pose compulsory military service in Ireland against the 
clearly expressed will of the Irish people. The passing 
of the Conscription Bill by the British House of Com- 
mons must be regarded as a declaration of war on the 
Irish nation. The alternative to accepting it as such is 
to surrender our liberties and to acknowledge ourselves 
slaves. It is in direct violation of the rights of small 
nationalities to self-determination, which even the Prime 
Minister of England — now preparing to employ naked 
militarism and force his Act upon Ireland — himself 
officially announced as an essential condition for peace 
at the Peace Conference. The attempt to enforce it will 
be an unwarrantable aggression, which we call upon all 
Irishmen to resist by the most effective means at their 
disposal." 

These pronouncements are sufficient indications of the 
light in which the Irish regard conscription and the 
lengths to which they are determined to go in preventing 
its operation. The Lord Mayor of Dublin applied for 
passports to visit America in order to lay his case be- 
fore the President, and he was assured that such pass- 
ports would be granted him ; he refused, however, to per- 



58 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

mit the proper authorities to examine the documents 
he was carrying and on this account the journey was 
not made. I was frequently asked about the attitude of 
America, "Are you coming here to shoot us down also V 9 
was a form which the query often took. And my reply 
always was the same : "I do not think America will have 
any part in the policing of Ireland. There has always 
existed in our country a great sympathy for the Irish 
cause, but I am quite sure the President and people will 
not look kindly upon any attempts or movements which 
are calculated to weaken England's efforts in the win- 
ning of the war." 

I was in Ireland during the spirited campaign in 
East Cavan between a nationalist candidate and Arthur 
Griffith, a Sinn Feiner who was at that time in Birming- 
ham prison on a charge of high treason. The Sinn Fein 
cause was being represented by various priests, and the 
result was a victory for Griffith, who gained strength by 
virtue of his prison experience, by a large majority. At 
this time excitement was running high. The proclama- 
tion of Lord French calling for 50,000 volunteers in lieu 
of conscription was referred to in the columns of "Young 
Ireland" as "the magnificent French farce," under a 
heading "Imperial Grand Theatre of Varieties." In re- 
gard to the call for the 50,000, the following is a char- 
acteristic editorial from the Sinn Fein press: 

"Like the Irish Times, we are certainly astonished 
at the very reasonable demand made by the Military 
Governor.and General Governor of Ireland. Fifty thou- 
sand ! Sure, boys, we would never miss that number of 



WHAT DOES IRELAND INTEND? 59 

fly-boys out of Ireland. Their fathers would still be here 
to contribute the 2,000 or 3,000 required monthly as 
from the first of October, 1918. We would, however, ad- 
vise Governor French not to expect too many of these 
fly-boys till about the day before the entries close, as 
they would not think of joining up in the middle of the 
season. They are getting nice and tanned at our seaside 
resorts, and, when caught, they will, we have no doubt, 
make good soldiers. Their papas, who only arrived 
over here recently, will be ready when their time comes. 
The younger fry are making themselves fit by constant 
exercise. As you will understand, hide and seek is a 
good fat-reducing medium, and, as most of them are 
continually 'on the run/ they will prove just the stuff 
you want, Jackie. The only request which they are 
likely to make is that they will be allowed to retain, 
when on more active service, their distinctive national 
costume — broad trousers and hipped coats. They are 
looking after the alteration of the facial and nasal de- 
partments themselves. When you get these 50,000 and 
the 5,000,000 American troops, you will have about 5,- 
000,000 good fighting men. If that is not enough, we 
know where more can be got. We append first lists : — 

Irish Times Office : 

Editorial— 9 likely, 2 fit. 

Works — Many probables and fit. 

Offices— 9 likely, 2 fit. 

Reporters — 1 likely, 4 fit. 

Young Ireland Office : 

Editorial — None likely, all fit. 



60 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

Works — None likely, all fit. 

Offices — None likely, all fit. 

Reporters — None likely, all fit. 

(Exemption claimed owing to the fact that theirs is 
work of national importance). 

Nationality Offices: 

(Same remarks as Young Ireland.) 

Freeman s Journal Offices: 

Editorial— 6 likely. 

(On government work.) 

Banba — 1 likely. 

(Cannot be spared, although as a fly-boy he should go 
with the first 50,000.) 

Letter writers — 20 likely. 

Works— 20 likely. 

Offices— 20 likely. 

Reporters — 5 likely. 

(Grand total— 82 probables.)" 

Perhaps one or two other quotations from Sinn Fein 
journals, picked up at random, will be illuminating. 
One paper thus observes: "Discovering plots is seem- 
ingly becoming an international (All-lies only) pastime. 
In France it is known as 'Boloism/ in England it is, we 
believe, called the 'Black Book, or the 47,000/ and 
America calls it 'Treason/ and, although enthusiasm 
dropped in the 'land of the free' after Police Inspector 
Flynn was deposed, it is now revived with a vengeance. 
Mr. Jeremiah O'Leary and ^ve others have been in- 
dicted by the Federal Grand Jury on charges of Trea- 



WHAT DOES IRELAND INTEND? 61 

Everywhere the most strenuous means are adopted to 
make the opposition to conscription and England unani- 
mous. Eor example, when several leaders were arrested 
for treasonable communications and plots with the en- 
emy, Sinn Fein demanded that all Ireland denounce 
these arrests. The Clogheen Guardians declined to pass 
the required resolution, and at once a convention was 
held at Burntcour, which forced two of the Guardians 
to resign and unanimously called on the others to do 
likewise. When Sinn Eein was declared to be a danger- 
ous organization the Armagh Asylum Committee dis- 
missed a store-keeper who was head of the local cumann, 
and the action was brought before every Sinn Fein club 
in the country, the members "being resolved to carry 
on the movement, as per instructions from the Executive 
in Dublin, regardless of any interference by the authori- 
ties." When the chairman of the Mullingar Board of 
Guardians was asked to resign his position as Justice of 
the Peace as a protest against conscription he declined, 
and immediately the board elected to succeed him a mem- 
ber of the Westmeath Sinn Fein Chaimhairle Ceann- 
tair. And the following item of news sheds an inter- 
esting light on Sinn Fein methods also : "Messrs. Thomas 
Hickey, Lisgibbon, and D. O'Brien, Golden, received a 
hearty welcome on their return home after two months' 
imprisonment in Belfast for drilling the local Volun- 
teers. They were met at the local station by a band and 
an enormous crowd, who escorted them to their homes." 

ISTow what does Ireland intend? Under the leader- 
ship of Sinn Fein she plans for complete and absolute 



62 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

independence, the making of Ireland into a separate Re- 
public. This Celtic I. W. W., this Irish Bolsheviki, will 
have no more to do with Home Rulers than she will with 
Ulster — the principles of both Nationalist and Unionist 
are alike rejected. In the attainment of their ambitions 
they do not ask any concessions or favors from Great 
Britain; the Sinn Eein members of Parliament refuse 
to take their seats at Westminster, and they maintain an 
attitude of aloofness from the motherland. They are at 
war with Great Britain, because the Mansion House 
Conference decreed that the conscription act was a dec- 
laration of hostilities. They go over the head of Parlia- 
ment and look to the Peace Conference for the righting 
of their wrongs and the establishment of the republic of 
their dreams. Drawing inspiration from the history and 
literature of their past, rejecting even the English lan- 
guage in so far as possible, they hope to appear at the 
conference table as a distinct and much-oppressed na- 
tionality clamoring for liberation. And on the Peace 
Conference they pin all their hones. Thus the matter 
is summed up by "Young Ireland": "When we said 
'nation' did we mean a shire of England ; did we mean 
a colony of the British Empire; did we mean that the 
Irish people would be much obliged to their oppressors 
for allowing them to contribute towards their own deg- 
radation ? Is a country that is content to pick up the 
crumbs of justice which may fall from the tables of her 
oppressor worthy of the honor of nationhood? What 
respect can a bully have for a cringing and fawning 
slave? 'Down on your knees, you dog,' sums up the 



WHAT DOES IRELAND INTEND? 63 

answer Ireland may expect to get for degrading herself 
by crawling through the filth of Westminster to kiss 
the feet of England's Prime Minister. If Ireland is a 
nation she can demand her rights at the Peace Con- 
ference. She cannot be content to remain in slavery." 

Supporting the plea for independence there is put for- 
ward a series of figures designed to prove that such a 
republic as Sinn Eein proposes could be self-support- 
ing. This has always been the difficulty encountered by 
the radicals, it having been a foregone conclusion that 
without Ulster, which shows no disposition to enter a 
republic and which possesses the wealth of Ireland, the 
new government could not maintain itself; therefore 
Sinn Fein has always coupled with a demand for inde- 
pendence a further demand that England grant to Ire- 
land a subsidy sufficient to pay the bills for a number of 
years. There now seems a disposition to abandon the 
latter phase of the matter, the leaders realizing its fu- 
tility and at the same time becoming convinced that they 
can support themselves. Their figures have been drawn 
up to show that Ireland has more square miles of ter- 
ritory than either Belgium, Holland, Denmark, or 
Switzerland, and about the same as Serbia, Greece, Por- 
tugal, and Bulgaria ; in the matter of population she is 
larger than Norway, Denmark, and Switzerland, and 
about the same in population as Serbia, Bulgaria, and 
Greece. It is pointed out that "Dublin Castle" rule cost 
Ireland last year 23,766,000 pounds, while Serbia, 
Greece, Switzerland, Bulgaria, Norway, and Denmark 
supported their governments at a much smaller expense. 



64 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

"Liberty costs only 32s. per head in Bulgaria, 35s. in 
Serbia, 37s. in Switzerland, 40s. in Greece, 51s. in 
Sweden, 55s. in Portugal, and 60s. in Norway; in Ire- 
land subjection and corruption cost us 5 pounds 8 shil- 
lings per head." "Judged by any standard we may 
select, Ireland is admirably fitted for freedom. She is 
large enough, populous enough, and rich enough. For the 
money we paid England .last year we could run the gov- 
ernment business of Bulgaria, Norway, and Denmark, 
paying for all their police^ soldiers, ships, and guns. Is 
not Ireland fooled and robbed long enough ? The hour 
for freedom and the Irish Republic has struck." It is 
unnecessary to discuss the correctness of these statistics 
or to inquire how they were obtained; to demonstrate 
their uselessness it is necessary only to point out that the 
statisticians quietly take it for granted that Ulster, the 
dominating factor in the matter of wealth and quite in- 
fluential in population and territory, will enter heartily 
into the new scheme. But this is by no means the case, 
for Ulster will have none of it ; and she stands ready to 
prove at any time to the entire satisfaction of the south 
that she cannot be coerced. 

Ireland has appeared clamoring at the Peace Confer- 
ence, and she has behind her the influence of the Vati- 
can. The whole course of recent events tends to con- 
firm this view. In every country where Irish propa- 
ganda is carried on, in America as well as in other 
lands, the movement is backed by the hierarchy of the 
Roman Catholic Church and headed by the adherents 
and priests of that communion; this fact makes it all 



WHAT DOES IRELAND INTEND? 65 

the more deplorable that the United States should tol- 
erate an agitation which constantly endeavors to en- 
gender bitterness toward the nation which should be 
our best friend — the British Empire. To those who have 
knowledge of the methods of the See of Rome it appears 
inconceivable that the Irish clergy would have launched 
on such a far-flung program of political aspiration with- 
out the consent of the Pope, and if that consent were 
given we may well inquire into the meaning of it. Does 
the Pope desire Ireland as another papal state? Will 
Ireland consent to be so placed ? That His Holiness de- 
sires a seat free from the sovereignty of any other power 
is well known, and Ireland is the only place on earth 
where his occupancy would meet with the approval of 
the population. That the Irishmen of the south would 
accept his lordship there seems not the slightest doubt 
— that Ulster would not, goes without saying. But since 
Ulster cannot be included in any nationalistic scheme 
without her protest, it may be that some scheme of par- 
ition is considered. 

I say one may well believe that both the Pope and the 
southern Irish have some such plan in consideration. 
Yet it is needless to discuss it, for its consummation is 
not even in the range of remote possibilities. Not a 
single nation among the Powers would approve it. 
And yet none need be surprised if some such agitation 
appears. 



CHAPTER III 

THE BOOT OF THE IRISH QUESTION 

The antagonism on the part of the Irish toward Eng- 
land is as old as the relations between these two coun- 
tries. Its roots run deep in history, and it still flour- 
ishes because it is constantly watered by religious agita- 
tion and prejudice. The Irish regard themselves as a 
subdued people in a conquered country. Possessing no 
historical sense and exaggerating their own abilities and 
virtues, they are totally blind to their own crimes while 
those of England loom large before them. "Like a 
wounded animal, Celtic Ireland is always licking her 
sores and nursing her anger. Her leaders are forever 
raking into the embers, or rather the burnt-out cinders, 
of the past. To them there is no amnesty of complaints, 
and the remembrance of mistakes and wrongs is ever 
fresh. Time brings no limitation of offenses, and no 
healing on its wings. Without a single grievance in the 
present, the self-styled Nationalists are forever talking 
of the old tyranny of England, and her old oppression 
of Ireland. "Not a word do they utter of England's 
awakened conscience, or of her sincere desire to remedy 
every wrong, and to conciliate every subject throughout 
her Empire." 

66 



ROOT OF THE IRISH QUESTION 67 

That the crimes of England toward Ireland have 
been great, no man, not even the most loyal English- 
man, would care to deny, and no lover of justice can 
hold a brief for her in this regard. But Ireland's 
skirts are not clear. Her cruelty has rivaled that of 
England, and as for intolerance her guilt is deeper in 
that she has never repented or forsaken her ways. She 
will not understand that actions are to be judged by the 
prevailing moral standards of the age in which they are 
performed, and not by the more exalted standards of 
more enlightened times. And so she goes back into past 
centuries and finds there oppressions, cruelties, and in- 
justices on the part of England, and when she finds 
them she drags them across the centuries unchanged and 
holds them up in the light of present day morality, in 
which they naturally appear repulsive. "This is Eng- 
land," she exclaims. But it is not England. It is the 
seventeenth century in the light of the most tender 
conscience the world ever knew. And when such a proc- 
ess is coupled with complete forgetfulness of her own 
shortcomings, it constitutes injustice and misrepresen- 
tation on the part of Ireland of the worst sort. Suppose 
the horrors and the unspeakable villainy of Ireland's 
massacre of Protestants, than which no more vile crime 
stains the page of history, were to be pictured in its 
true colors and underneath it the legend were placed, 
"This is Ireland !" There would be a world-wide Irish 
protest, and justly so. Yet the stock in trade of Irish 
agitators even to-day is the painting of just such por- 
traits of England. And this in spite of the fact that no 



68 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

people on earth have had greater concessions made to 
them than the Irish have received from England in the 
past two generations. 

Ireland is indeed a conquered country. She was in- 
vaded first hy the Normans at the close of the eighth 
century. In the middle of the twelfth century Pope 
Adrian IV granted Ireland to Henry II with instruc- 
tions .to possess the island "for the purpose of enlarging 
the borders of the Church, setting bounds to the progress 
of wickedness, reforming evil manners, planting virtue, 
and increasing the Christian religion." It surely seems 
that the Irish would respect the signature, on that deed ! 
Erom that day the soil of Ireland has been the scene of 
almost constant warfare. ~Ho less than four times the 
country has been conquered, and the insurrections and 
rebellions have been innumerable. A history of Ireland 
is most wearisome reading, being as it is a long, verbose 
record of rebellions, plots, schemes, intrigues, injus- 
tice, oppression, and bloodshed. England found the 
ancient tribal system of land tenure in vogue in Ireland, 
and indeed the people have not yet gone beyond their 
ideals of such a tenure. The feudal system conflicted 
sharply with the holdings of the clan, and through the 
process of wars and consequent confiscation of the lands 
of the rebel chieftains the landlord system, which has 
been the curse of Ireland, was built up. These land- 
lords were largely absentees, holding lands from which 
the Irish themselves had been driven, exacting rents 
from the poverty-stricken peasants, and holding these at 
their mercy. Through the system of ejectments which 



ROOT OF THE IRISH QUESTION 69 

was practiced, thousands of persons were thrown from 
their homes and lands, and suffering untold became the 
consequence. And when on top of all this England 
passed laws to kill the Irish trade because of its compe- 
tition with English commerce, the climax of suffering 
was reached. 

To this there was added the religious persecution of 
the people. Henry VIII attempted to extirpate Cathol- 
icism, and the Penal Laws which were directed against 
the Catholics were oppressive in the extreme. They 
were denied some of the most fundamental of all human 
rights, and the steel entered their soul to leave a rancor 
that has never passed away. Religious persecution is 
never justified, but it is simple truth to say that the 
English in Ireland are not the only ones who will have 
to answer for crimes in this regard. Roman Catholics, 
of all people, can condemn Protestants for intolerance 
with the least consistency, for the entire history of this 
Church shows that it has also been one of her favorite 
weapons. And it has been used in -Ireland. Each time, 
declare the Protestants, that the Catholics have gained 
the ascendency they have been as bitter and as cruel 
against their enemies as any people have ever been to- 
ward themselves ; in fact they have resorted to measures 
so extreme against Protestants that they shock the world 
even to-day. "We have learned from history," say the 
Protestants, "that the Irish or Celtic party, when it pos- 
sessed supreme power, abused the opportunity to plunder 
the wealthy and industrious Protestants ; and we can see 



70 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

no change in the sentiments of a faction which has al- 
ways displayed rancor and race-hatred towards us." 

When we remember the prevailing ideas of the days 
in which these evils flourished we may find some sort of 
justification to apply to both sides. The confiscations 
were all according to law and were the result of rebel- 
lions on the part of the old holders. The Penal Laws 
were retaliations for the Catholic oppressions of Protes- 
tants under the reign of Tyrconnel. But nothing can be 
said for the commerce laws and the destruction of Irish 
trade. These were the results of the most selfish kind 
of perversity, and for them England deserves and has 
obtained the contempt of the civilized world. But for 
all other grievances one will have difficulty in deciding 
whose misdeeds weigh heaviest in the scales, unless we 
do as is common and follow the lead of our own preju- 
dices in the matter. And so if we expect to find in the 
past history of the English and Irish relations the basis 
for a just settlement of their present misunderstanding 
we will be disappointed ; the matter grounds in history, 
but this history is so tangled and crisscrossed with abuses 
and counter abuses that it is well-nigh impossible to 
disengage the various strands and estimate the compara- 
tive degrees of guilt. 

Ireland is a conquered country which has never rec- 
ognized the claims of the conqueror. She has been 
subjected to a. long line of persecutions; her terri- 
tory has been devastated, her people have been killed, 
she has been taxed for the support of a foreign and 
minority Church, her land has been wrested from her, 



ROOT OF THE IRISH QUESTION 71 

and ignominy of a thousand sorts has been heaped 
upon her. This is her case. But England retorts that 
she has a case also. Ireland has refused to be pacified, 
and has endeavored to give aid and comfort to every 
enemy that England ever had. She has murdered Prot- 
estants, and has organized a long line of prowling bands 
for the purposes of terrorizing the Protestants, driving 
off their cattle, burning their homes, and devastating 
their fields. Her emigrants have plotted against Eng- 
land on the soil of all the civilized nations of the earth. 
And thus the case stands. Far better would it be to call 
the contest a draw, forget the past, and effect a settle- 
ment on the basis of the present day situation. And on 
this basis no man can truthfully accuse England of treat- 
ing Ireland with any degree of hardness; the exact op- 
posite is the case. 

The positions of the three different parties in Ireland 
are well known. First, and most important from every 
angle except in numerical strength, there are the Union- 
ists, commonly known as the Ulster Protestants. They 
possess the wealth, the energy, the ability, and the in- 
telligence of Ireland, and hold an unquestioned com- 
mercial supremacy. The inhabitants of northeast Ul- 
ster are descendants of English colonists, and their po- 
litical attitude is that of a steady loyalty to the British 
Empire. It is by no means true that they are not de- 
voted to Ireland, but they take the position that the inter- 
ests of their island will be furthered by its connection 
with England. They are opposed to most phases of the 
Home Rule movement, and that for various reasons: 



72 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

One is religious. The northern Protestants fear re- 
ligious oppression at the hands of the Catholic majority 
if political control is vested in that majority. They 
remember the former massacres and it is their convic- 
tion that the Irish character has not changed ; "I think 
it is not very unreasonable to suppose and believe that 
what the Irish people have done before they will do 
again," said Lord Harrington, and this expresses the 
sentiment of Ulster. Another reason is commercial. 
These Protestants possess the wealth and the industries* 
of Ireland. But they are in a minority, and self-govern- 
ment would mean that they would have to finance the 
government while its affairs were administered by their 
enemies. Under the Irish situation the control of poli- 
tics opens the way for abuses and oppressions of various 
kinds, and Ulster cannot be convinced that such, would 
not be directed against her. Then there is the political 
side of the question. The north holds that there is no 
hope for Ireland detached from Britain. Such a Repub- 
lic as might be set up would be the center of foreign in- 
trigues and its position would make Ireland an easy and 
desirable prey for other powers. Her location on the 
shore of England would make all such movements in- 
imical to that country, and in the end that Power would 
have no course open to her except to again conquer Ire- 
land. Thus argue the Protestants. 

The second party, the one that for long was the most 
numerous, calls itself the Nationalists. It embraces 
that section of the people who have so long contended for 
Home Rule, and they believe that the entire control of 



ROOT OF THE IRISH QUESTION 73 

Irish affairs should be in the hands of the Irish them- 
selves. They have consistently demanded this of Eng- 
land. On their side they have most of the political argu- 
ments that appeal to the modern world ; they have been 
in the majority and their demand for control of their 
own affairs is legitimate. This party is predominantly 
Roman Catholic and it has always had the support of 
the hierarchy of the Church. Priests have been its 
leaders and agitators. And herein lies the reason of 
its failure thus far, and the basis for the suspicions of 
Ulster. 

The third group are the extremists who now call them- 
selves the Sinn Feiners. They are a continuation of the 
old Fenian movement, and they draw their inspiration 
from the history, genius, and literature of old Ireland. 
These people go the whole length, and demand abso- 
lute and final separation from England. 'Ireland must 
be erected into an independent Republic and her talents 
must be allowed free exercise in her own life. This is 
also a Catholic movement, although it is not so distinctly 
religious as the Nationalist party and really embraces 
many Protestants in its fold. Its leaders are for the 
most part sincere and enthusiastic patriots. But it jcom- 
prises the radical element of the country, and has been 
called the I. W. W. of Ireland. It opposes the aims of 
the Nationalists in that it will not agree to any half- 
way measures and advocates armed revolt against Eng- 
land. On this account it is regarded as a traitorous con- 
spiracy by the government, and the Easter revolt, ac- 
complished while the Empire was struggling for exis- 



74 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

tence and with the connivance of the enemy, has em- 
bittered the English against it. 

In any settlement of the Irish Question these three 
groups must be dealt with, and the claim of Great 
Britain must also be considered. Britain demands, and 
has a right to demand, that any government set up on 
her shore, especially from a part of her own body, shall 
be friendly to herself and thoroughly trustworthy. But 
she has no reason to believe that any Irish Bepublic 
would be friendly to her ; the mind, history, and general 
attitude of Ireland make her think, indeed, that such a 
government would be hostile. Since the Irish have in- 
trigued with every enemy that England ever had, it is 
natural that such suspicions should be aroused. 

The problem of the pacification of Ireland is thus ex- 
ceedingly complicated by the fact that all four of the 
interests concerned stand upon platforms that are reason- 
able and legitimate. The suspicions of both England 
and Ulster are well founded, as history attests, and the 
safeguards demanded by both are legitimate. According 
to all our ideas of democracy the majority should rule 
and Ireland should have the right to direct her own af- 
fairs, and thus the Nationalists gain strength. And 
again, no man can dispute the fact that the Irish genius 
should have free exercise, and that no people should be 
held under an alien power against their own will, and 
here lies the power of Sinn Fein. But the real issue 
lies between Ulster and the Sinn Eeiners, although 
neither of them will be likely to win in the contest. I 
say the real issue lies between them, because the aims of 



ROOT OF THE IRISH QUESTION 75 

the Nationalists are ultimately the same as those of the 
Sinn Feiners. While this party has been willing to take 
all that it could get, and has agitated for Home Rule 
in the halls of Westminster, no one has supposed 
that Ireland would he pacified when it was granted. 
If such had been the case it might have been had 
long ago. But the securing of Home Rule would have 
been nothing but a signal for the renewal of the agita- 
tion, this time directed at a complete break. Hence the 
Sinn Fein contingent drive directly at the thing which 
the Nationalists ultimately desire. One of the most 
acute analysts of Ireland has recently written: "I be- 
lieve that nothing short of complete self-government has 
ever been the object of Irish Nationalism. However 
ready certain sections have been* to accept installments, 
no Irish political leader ever had authority to pledge 
his countrymen to accept a half measure as a final set- 
tlement of the Irish claim. The Home Rule act, if put 
into operation to-morrow, even if Ulster were cajoled 
or coerced into accepting it, would not be regarded by the 
Irish Nationalists as a final settlement, no matter what 
may be said at Westminster. Nowhere in Ireland has it 
been accepted as final. Received without enthusiasm at 
first, every year which has passed since the bill was in- 
troduced has seen the system of self-government formu- 
lated there subjected to more acute and hostile criticism : 
and I believe it would be perfectly accurate to say that 
its passing to-morrow would only be the preliminary for 
another agitation, made fiercer by the unrest of the 
world, where revolutions and the upsetting of dynasties 



76 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

are in the air, and where the claims of nationalities no 
more ancient than the Irish, like the Poles, the Finns, 
and the Arabs, to political freedom are admitted by the 
spokesmen of the great powers, Great Britain included, 
or are already conceded." (A. E. : "Thoughts for A 
Convention: Memorandum on the State of Ireland," 
1917.) 

The position of England is well known ; she is willing 
for Ireland to have nearly anything that she wants, if 
the island can set her own house in order, settle her own 
internal troubles, and offer certainties that England and 
English people will not be threatened. But England is 
in a strained and unenviable position. Ireland is a con- 
stant menace to her, in this war, in every war, and even 
in times of peace. Far better would it be to throw Ire- 
land to the winds and let her take care of herself. But 
this cannot be done, because England is in duty bound to 
protect herself from the intrigues of a free Ireland, and 
also to protect English people in Ireland from oppression 
and destruction at the hands of the so-called native Irish. 
So the Irish Question is in all reality an Irish Question. 
It is an internal problem which the people themselves 
must work out. 

Of course the difficulty they will encounter will be 
Ulster. It seems somewhat strange that the most en- 
lightened and prosperous part of Ireland should be the 
very section wherein is contained the most determined 
and bitter opposition to Irish freedom. But it is easy 
to understand when we have even the most casual ac- 
quaintance with the history of Ulster and the mind of 



ROOT OF THE IRISH QUESTION 11 

the Ulster people. They are called Irishmen, but they 
have practically no Irish blood in their veins; they are 
the descendants of the British colonists who were sent 
into Ireland to occupy the land under James and Crom- 
well. At the accession of James the land of Ulster was 
desolate, inhabited by a low Irish peasantry and owned 
by the great earls of Tyrone and Tyrconnel, the O'Neill 
and O'Donnell chieftains. After a rebellion in which 
they joined forces with the Spanish, the earls were 
forced to flee and their lands were forfeited to the 
Crown. James then conceived the idea of the Planta- 
tion of Ulster with border people from England, hoping 
to settle the border feuds in his own country and at the 
same time to introduce order and prosperity into north- 
ern Ireland. Other plantations had been attempted in 
Ireland and they had all failed, but to James it ap- 
peared that these failures had been due to the fact that 
the colonists had intermarried with the natives and thus 
been absorbed. His idea was to transplant a sturdier 
people and to send their women with them to prevent 
intermarriage. Thus were the Protestants sent, whether 
or no, to Ireland. The scheme of James worked, the 
presence of the English women and the barrier of re- 
ligion preventing intermarriage, and under the industry 
of these settlers Ulster began to blossom and to bear 
fruit. 

All went well until the fateful year of 1641, when the 
Irish Catholics rose at a signal and began the systematic 
butchery of the Protestants, and the massacre was fol- 
lowed by a civil war that continued twelve years. His- 



78 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

torians have exhausted the powers of language in their 
attempts to depict the horrible cruelties of these wanton 
murders. Men, women, and children were drowned, 
burned, ripped open, and killed in every conceivable way 
in this attempt to exterminate the foreigners, and in the 
massacre and the war that followed it has been estimated 
that no less than 200,000 Protestants lost their lives. 
And thus the plantation of James failed. The rebel- 
lion was put down by Cromwell, who went about the task 
in his customary energetic way; in this he earned the 
never-dying hatred of the Irish, but it is likely that the 
measures of Cromwell were excusable according to the 
tenets of warfare then existing, and even mild and gen- 
erous in the case of non-combatants. Cromwell saw that 
the English colonists would always be in danger as long 
as the sullen Irish remained in the province, so he ban- 
ished them across the Shannon and divided, the land 
among his soldiers. This is the basis of the Irish griev- 
ance, and the reason why "the curse o' Crummel" is re-' 
membered to this day : the lands were then safely in the 
possession of the foreigners. 

Then began the midnight prowlings of the Rapparees, 
a proceeding for which the island is famous. Organized 
bands of cattle drivers and moonlight prowlers, the Rap- 
parees, the Houghers, the .White-Boys, the Right-Boys, 
the Defenders, the Molly Maguires, the rvibbqnmen, the 
Moonlighters, the Land-Leaguers, and others, appeared 
to carry on systematic outrages against the fields, crops, 
stock, and persons of the settlers. Under the reign of 
the last of the Stuarts the Protestants were disarmed and 



ROOT OF THE IRISH QUESTION 79 

excluded from the army, thus placing them at the mercy 
of their foes. James II fled to Ireland and civil war 
broke out under his standard, but this was brought to an 
end by William of Orange, who was supported by the 
Protestants. In 1798 another rebellion started under 
the leadership of the United Irishmen. This League 
had started some years before as a non-sectarian move- 
ment and some Protestants were connected with it, but 
it was soon discovered that the United Irishmen were 
the supporters of the prowling Defenders and the Protes- 
tants scented danger. When the rebellion began it soon 
developed into a Catholic war on the Protestants, and the 
cruelties and massacres perpetrated on the settlers out- 
did those of the days of 1641. They were impaled on 
pikes, roasted before slow fires, and tortured in many 
ways. It was from this war that the Orange Lodge and 
a defensive organization called the "Peep o' Day Boys" 
took their rise. 

Thus is indicated the historical basis of the Irish 
Question as it concerns Ulster. The antagonism of the 
Irish is based upon the fact that there are some thou- 
sands of foreign people in possession of land which three 
hundred years ago belonged to their fathers, and back of 
most of the agitation lies the desire to repossess this land. 
Generation after generation hand down the tradition, 
and they publish maps showing the fertile fields of Ul- 
ster parceled out among the old families. Never have 
they regarded the settlers in any other light than that of 
usurpers; never have they conceded their right to the 
lands of Ulster. Lord Ernest Hamilton, formerly a 



80 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

Member of Parliament from North Tyrone, a man who 
for years was in the center of the political life of Ire- 
land, has thus stated the case from the standpoint of 
Ulster. "The only attraction of Home Kule to the inner 
soul of the Irish (especially in Ulster) is the hope that it 
will provide the machinery by which the British colo- 
nists can be got rid of and Irish soil revert once more to 
the Irish. In Ulster the cry of 'Ireland for the Irish' 
is not the mere innocent expression of a laudable patrio- 
tism ; it has a deeper and a far more sinister meaning. 
It means the expulsion from Ireland of the Protestant 
colonists, and it is so understood clearly by both sections 
of the population. There are no sentimental illusions 
in Ulster, whatever there may be in England. Home 
Rule holds out to the native Irish a coveted and substan- 
tial prize which lies under their very hands to pluck, 
and which faces them enticingly at every 'turn of their 
daily labor. Half the lands of Ulster, and that the best 
and the richest, are in the hands of the stranger within 
the gates. It matters nothing that these lands, when 
originally granted, were waste, and that the industry of 
the colonists has made them rich. It matters nothing 
that Ulster was then a sink of murder, misery, and vice, 
and that now it is a land of smiling prosperity. The 
natives know none of these things ; they are not politi- 
cally educated along these lines. All they know is that 
the lands were once theirs, and that they are now occu- 
pied by colonists of another race and another religion. 
And so they cry, or, rather, they mutter under their 
breath, 'Ireland for the Irish/ a cry which, under the ex- 




CORNER OF SACKVII.LE STREET IX DUBLIN AFTER THE 
SINN FEIN REBELLION OF 1916 




WRECKED SHOPS IN DUBLIN AFTER THE SINN FEIN 
REBELLION OF 1916 



ROOT OF THE IRISH QUESTION 81 

paneling influence of J. Kinahan, becomes freely trans- 
lated into Ho hell or to the sea with every bloody Protes- 
tant.' There is not a Boman Catholic in Ulster to whom 
the promise of Home Rule does not mean the promise of 
the recovery of forfeited lands. In some districts the 
lands of the Protestant farmers have already been offi- 
cially allotted among the native population." ("The 
Soul of Ulster," 112, 117, 120-121.) 

As early as 1793 a Dr. Duigenan, who had been 
reared a Catholic but who adopted Protestantism in 
manhood, pointed out this phase of the question in an 
address before the Irish Parliament. "The Irish Cath- 
olics," he said, "to a man esteem all Protestants as 
usurpers of their estates. To this day they settle those 
estate?, on 'the marriage of their sons and daughters. 
They have accurate maps of them. They have lately 
published in Dublin a map of this kingdom cantoned 
out among the old proprietors. They abhor all Protes- 
tants and all Englishmen as plunderers and oppressors, 
exclusive of their detestation of them as heretics." 

So the situation stands to-day. Behind both race and 
religion there lies the fact that the settlers are in pos- 
session of lands that once belonged to the Irish, and the 
deepest conviction of the Irish soul is that these lands 
should be restored. This means the expulsion of the 
English from Ireland. It is possible to work up a vast 
deal of sympathy for the Irish claim, when we remember 
how the lands came into English hands. But with all 
this, it is impossible to think that dispossession of the 
settlers would be either just or beneficial. It is unde- 



82 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

niable that these settlers have made out of land once 
waste a province surpassing anything in southern Ire- 
land for fruitfulness, and have built up in Ulster a sys- 
tem of commerce upon which all Ireland depends for 
revenue. It is therefore apparent that the restitution 
of this section to the natives would work to the disad- 
vantage of the country. 

Then, entirely apart from the ethics of the planta- 
tions, it must not be forgotten that no one of the Eng- 
lish, and none of their ancestors remembered by them, 
were concerned. For three hundred years they have 
been in undisputed possession, and even at the time the 
natives were dispossessed the will of the settlers them- 
selves did not dictate governmental action. So however 
unjust the original settlement may have been, dispos- 
session at this late day would be a thousand times more 
unjust. Furthermore, according to the codes of that 
day, and it is unallowable to judge on the basis of any 
other code, the plantations were perfectly legal. The 
lands were declared confiscate on account of rebellion, 
the people were banished beyond the Shannon for the 
same reason, and all of the cruelties of which they so 
bitterly complain were thus caused. 

But this phase of the question carries us into the 
whole range of the morality of colonization, and this 
concerns practically the entire earth. Would it be right 
for the American Indians to insist upon a restitution of 
the land and the expulsion of the people who now 
occupy them ? If we grant the contention of the native 
Irish the principle should be carried further. Give 



ROOT OF THE IRISH QUESTION 83 

England back to the Welsh and expel France from 
Algiers, Canadians from Canada, and all European na- 
tions from India and Africa ! This would be the proper 
course of procedure to accompany the expulsion of the 
settlers from Ireland. 

This, then, explains the opposition of Ulster to Home 
Rule, an opposition that is stern, unbending, and uncom- 
promising. It will go to the full length. When the 
Home Rule bill which now stands on the statute books 
was enacted into law in 1914, Ulster announced her in- 
tention to fight, and she made ready her instruments of 
warfare. The operation of the law was suspended in 
view of this attitude. And a great injustice is done to 
the best citizenship of Ireland when people do not re- 
member that she opposes, not Home Rule, but the conse- 
quences of expulsion, robbery, murder, and oppression, 
which she believes would inevitably follow. She deems 
it not very unreasonable to suppose and believe that what 
the Irish people have done before they will do again. 

That Home Rule would give, an opportunity for such 
injustice, even with all conceivable safeguards, is very 
true. There would be no more open murders, and per- 
haps no openly adverse legislation. But the offices would 
be filled with the hostile element, injustices would creep 
into the taxation, prowlings and rapine would be con* 
thmed, juries would be sympathetic, and even legislative 
and judicial bodies might take cognizance of the natives' 
plea that they were entitled to the lands of the north. 
All this is a possibility under Home Rule, and Ulster 
thinks she possesses enough knowledge of the native char- 



84 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

acter to know that such opportunities are never lost. And 
so the deadlock stands. If England should stand apart 
and allow the Irish to fight it out, Ulster could never be 
conquered. She stands ready at any time, with her 
facilities, to defeat three times her own number of na- 
tives. And a self-governing Ireland without Ulster can- 
not support herself, for the north possesses all the wealth 
of the island. This lends support to the Ulster side, for 
in spite of the doctrine of majority rule, there is ground 
for objection when the south expects the north to pay 
all the bills while the south, with all her hostility, runs 
the country. "What," asks Ulster, "if the Eed Indians 
outnumbered the Canadians iive to two and the govern- 
ment should be placed in their hands ?" 

The venom recoils on the head of England, but she is 
in no way to blame. She has long stood ready to make 
any concession to Ireland when the people settled their 
own differences and made known their desires. But she 
cannot permit her own people to be dispossessed and 
destroyed, nor can she permit a Republic to be set up by 
her side which would harbor enemy agents and become 
the hot-bed of intrigue against her; the action of the 
Irish in every war the Motherland has ever waged makes 
England exceedingly and justifiably wary in this re- 
gard. In the meanwhile, she has gone to the most un* 
usual length in her attempts to pacify the unpacifiable 
people. Realizing that the landlord system was making 
against the people, she arbitrarily and forcibly dispos- 
sessed the landlords through a series of land laws, and 
now the land has passed largely into the hands of the 



ROOT OF THE IRISH QUESTION 85 

people themselves. If any Irishman aspires to become 
a landowner, the way is open to him. England will loan 
him all the money to make the purchase, she will com- 
pel the landlord to sell at a reasonable figure, and she 
will allow the native half a century to return the money 
at an insignificant rate of interest. If the native is a 
laborer and does not desire a farm, he is at no disad- 
vantage. For England will take a selected piece of 
ground, build upon it an elegant and adequate cottage, 
and let the cottage to the laborer for a rent that is a 
mere pittance. I do not know of any other people who 
are so treated. But these measures on the part of Eng- 
land meet with no gratitude from the Irish ; "what vir- 
tue is there," they ask, "in paying back in installments 
what was originally stolen en hlocf 

The impartial observer will very likely believe that 
there is no salvation apart from the British Empire for 
the Irish. Ulster will never agree to cast her lot with 
such a Republic as the extreme Sinn Feiners propose, 
and they cannot compel the northern province. And 
without her no Republic can support itself. This is 
recognized, and the Sinn Fein faction go to the unusual 
length of demanding that England repay their treason 
and intrigues by setting them up as a Republic and at 
the same time making them an allowance large enough 
to pay their bills — this, they claim, is what England owes 
to Ireland. At the present time this faction will accept 
nothing less. When England proposed the convention 
of all the Irish for the purpose of arriving at a solu- 
tion of their own differences, the Sinn Feiners held 



86 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

back and refused their cooperation, thus placing them- 
selves in the position of obstructionists. It is difficult to 
believe that the Irish could really govern themselves 
on the Emerald Isle ; it is quite certain they could not, 
either in finances or in peaceable administration, if 
Ulster held back. 

Sinn Fein should modify its demands and Ulster 
should modify hers, thus finding a basis of settlement on 
the Home Rul6 platform. Guarantees of the most sin- 
cere and liberal kind must be thrown about Ulster, and 
the connection with Great Britain must be retained. 
This, is not only true for the purpose of securing the al- 
legiance of the northern province, but also for the pro- 
tection of Ireland herself. A weak and struggling Re- 
public, bordering the .coast of England, has no chance 
in these days in Europe. Her desire is to place herself 
under the protection of Germany, but in this she would 
be out of the frying pan into the fire, to say nothing 
of the menace this would afford to England. An Ire- 
land with the status of a dominion, enjoying a degree 
of Home Rule that will protect her Protestant inhabit- 
ants, seems to be the solution of the problem until both 
sides grow into a more lenient attitude. 



CHAPTER IV 



THE POPE AND THE WAR 



The Pope of Home is more deeply interested in the ex- 
ternal facts of the European war than the head of any 
other ecclesiastical organization, and the war naturally 
affects the communion of which he is the head more 
vitally than any other Church. This is true because 
of the nature, the claims, and the historical attitude of 
the Eoman Catholicism. It once possessed temporal 
power greater than that of national rulers, and one of its 
fundamental tenets is that the Church, being the direct 
representative of God on earth, has a right to exercise 
external authority of various kinds. This principle 
not only applies to the affairs of state, perhaps we may 
say that in this field it urges its claim with less insist- 
ence than elsewhere; but in the matter of morals, the- 
ology, interpretation, and even history it insists upon 
a recognition of this authority. Protestants generally 
disapprove of such a claim, but there is something to be 
said for it nevertheless. The point here to be made, 
however, is that such an attitude inevitably gives the 
Pope, as the head of his Church, an interest in the diplo- 
matic affairs of all peoples, and when these affairs issue 
in war that interest is very much intensified. And if,. 

87 



88 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

as in the present instance, nations which recognize offi- 
cially the claims of the Pope are pitted against each 
other, the interest becomes so vital that it conld not 
possibly be ignored. And so the Roman Catholic 
Church had a concern in the war that went far beyond 
the purely moral and spiritual interest which all com- 
munions shared in common. She is supposed to exert an 
influence in its settlement that is different in kind from 
the influence of other Churches — the logic of her his- 
torical position makes this necessary. 

Accordingly, we have had many evidences that the 
war has been the subject of deep consideration on the 
part of the Vatican. The Pope has even gone beyond 
the defined attitude of the Church, and he has an- 
nounced that he regards all the belligerents as his chil- 
dren and himself as the common father, irrespective of 
the affiliations adopted by these people and their gov- 
ernments — even though they are "not yet" Catholics, he 
puts it. Many times he has issued prayers, addresses, 
and appeals to the belligerent nations, urging peace. He 
made a strenuous effort to secure a Christmas truce, and 
as a matter of fact such an armistice was quite generally 
observed by the armies, although it was not accepted by 
the authorities; we are told by the soldiers themselves 
that at Christmas they sang across "No Man's Land" 
from trench to trench, exchanged cigarettes and delica- 
cies, and fraternized quite freely and generally. Then 
the Pope exerted a very great influence in securing 
the exchange of prisoners who were incapacitated, for 
military service, in having thousands of prisoners trans- 



THE POPE AND THE WAR 89 

ferred to Switzerland, where they received much better 
treatment and attention, and in securing commutation 
of sentences and pardons for a large number of con- 
demned persons. There is no doubt that in these mat- 
ters the Pope was able to exert an influence for great 
good ; he strengthened himself with a large element, and 
as far as he was able to go he really earned the gratitude 
of mankind. 

The Vatican therefore believes that it has added very 
much to its prestige during the war. Both England and 
Russia sent ministers of state to Rome accredited to 
the Vatican, which action is taken by the Church to 
mean that these countries are coming to recognize the 
authority of the Pope. But this is a mistaken idea. So 
far as England, at least, is concerned the action was 
taken solely because the representatives of the Central 
Powers were constantly in touch with the Pope, and 
England felt it necessary to have a representative on the 
ground to prevent possible intrigues. So these ambas- 
sadors are little better than secret service agents of the 
governments accrediting them, and instead of indicating 
a kindlier feeling towards the Church they really sig- 
nify a suspicion that is the very reverse of kindness. 

The simple truth is that the Pope is everywhere con- 
sidered pro-German. His enemies constantly accuse him 
of having been in league with the Central Powers. In 
the first place, there is the fact that Austria was the 
greatest Catholic nation on earth, and the relations be- 
tween the Vatican and Vienna are well known. It is 
impossible that the Pope should look with compla- 



90 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

cence upon the prospect of seeing Austria crushed, for 
if there still remained a hope of regaining temporal 
supremacy or of securing another group of papal states, 
such a hope was undoubtedly closely bound up with the 
success of Austria. And that meant nothing but the 
triumph of Germany. 

In the second place, the Pope has been subjected to a 
vast deal of criticism because of his refusal, or failure, 
to denounce the invasion of Belgium and the outrages 
consequent upon such invasion. In view of the fact 
that Belgium was one of the countries still loyal to the 
papacy, some such action was expected; and when it 
failed to materialize an idea prevailed that the silence 
was due to the fact that such a protest would have been 
a denunciation of the Central Powers. 

Again, there are those who believe that the Church 
cherishes a deep resentment against France, once her 
favorite child, for having cast off the establishment some 
years ago, and that she would not have been averse to 
seeing Prance humiliated, especially if such humiliation 
were accompanied by advantages accruing to Austria. 
This is strenuously denied by Catholics; they declare 
that France is still the favorite daughter of the Vati- 
can in spite of her defection. But as a matter of fact, 
it is plain to be seen that there is a deep gulf between 
France and Rome. France was the last nation to ex- 
press any gratitude to the Pope for his services in the 
transfer of prisoners, and her reticence has been much 
commented upon. Then France is the only nation that 
does not exempt priests from military service ; thousands 



THE POPE AND THE WAR 91 

of them were conscripted and fought in the trenches. 
While this action indicated a lack of consideration on 
the part of the government towards the Church, it has 
really been of great advantage to the Church. While in 
the other allied countries there is wide spread dissatis- 
faction because of the exemption of the clergy, which 
has lost to them much respect and prestige, the French 
priests have gained immeasurably in the opinions of 
the people because of their experience in the trenches. 

In addition to this alleged sentiment towards France, 
there exists the fact that the Vatican has no reason to 
ally herself closely to England. Here she gets no hope 
of a recognition of temporal authority. The actions of 
the priests in Ireland, and the disloyalty of the Catholic 
population in this island generally, have angered and ex- 
asperated England to such an extent that there is a 
deep prejudice against the Church which reaches even 
through the colonies of the British Empire. Then there 
is the further fact that the Pope is not on good terms 
with Italy, and Italy is not on good terms with the Pope. 
The Church regards the state as having usurped the au- 
thority and stolen the territory of the Pope, and the 
fiction of "the prisoner of the Vatican" keeps alive 
this attitude. All of these things naturally contribute to 
the feeling that the Pope desired the defeat of the allied 
cause. 

On the other hand, it is asserted that certain inter- 
ests and hopes bound the Church to the cause of the 
Central Powers. Austria was, of course, the strongest 
bond of attachment. But the Vatican was said to have 



92 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

had interests in Germany also. It is qnite true that this 
is the home of the Reformation and the anathematized 
Lutheranism ; hut Germany has a large Catholic element 
in her population, and this element exerts a considerable 
influence. Several of the states are Catholic and con- 
tinue relations with Rome. And the Center Party is 
wholly Catholic. So even in Germany the Pope had a 
basis for hape, according to those who have conjectures 
upon such matters. 

Then again, the incident of Mgr. Gerlach's conviction 
contributed still more to the belief that Benedict 
XV is pro-German. Gerlach, although a German and 
a former officer in the German army, enjoyed the con- 
fidence and patronage of the Pope in a remarkable de- 
gree, and the Pope appointed him "Cameriere segreto 
participante" and Keeper of the Wardrobe. Suspicion 
fell upon him because of his connection with the Prus- 
sian agents in Rome, but even after Italy entered the 
war he was kept in his position in the Vatican. It later 
developed that Gerlach had taken charge of the Ger- 
man espionage system; he disbursed German money, 
subsidized the press, and managed the entire work of 
propaganda and spying. Although he was sentenced to 
death by the government, the priest made his escape into 
Germany. There is no evidence that his holiness was in 
any way concerned in the matter, but the mere fact that 
a traitor should be found among the papal officials, and 
that such a man was retained in office after Italy had 
declared war against his government, gave the enemies of 
the Vatican a chance to make capital against it, 



THE POPE AND THE WAR 93 

Even the attempts of the Pope to secure peace were 
used against him by those who sought to convict 
him of being pro-German. It is well known that all of 
the peace offers came from the side of the Central 
allies, and when the voice of the Vatican was lifted it 
was considered to be a voice from the same side. And 
that is one reason so little attention was paid to such 
proposals looking to peace: they were considered by 
the Allies exactly as if they emanated from the enemy ; 
while this was not the official attitude, of course, it was 
the attitude of the people at large, and the one under 
which the governments were supposed to move. This at- 
titude was strengthened when the Pope put forth his 
definite peace program, for that was a proposition 
which Germany could have well afforded to accept. 
While it refused to Germany the annexations and indem- 
nities which she hoped to gain, it must be remembered 
that she had already practically despaired of ever ob- 
taining her ambitions; and even a return to the status 
quo ante bellum would still have left Germany dominat- 
ing Central Europe through her alliances, as President 
Wilson pointed out, and this would have been a prac- 
tical victory for her. 

There were several points in the Pope's proposal 
which could hardly have been accepted by the Allies. In 
the first place, it provided that Belgium should be evacu- 
ated and guaranteed independence — nothing more. 
Now that was exactly the case with Belgium before she 
was outraged, and this proposal made no provision for 
a guarantee on the part of Germany that such inde- 



94* SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

pendence should be respected other than the Teutonic 
word of honor. Belgium had that word of honor, ratified 
by a solemn treaty, before this war began, and Germany 
declared it to be "a scrap of paper." So when nothing 
was offered to Belgium except another treaty of the 
same sort, it was plain to see that she could only reject 
it. There was no security in it, to say nothing of the 
injustice of having Germany simply evacuate after de- 
stroying Belgian property and life. 

In the second place, the proposal was voided by its 
treatment of the problems of Alsace-Lorraine and the 
Italian Irredenta. These territories, because of his- 
tory, nationality, and the desires of the people, should 
have been taken from Germany and Austria, and it was 
clearly no settlement of the questions to suggest "peace- 
able negotiation." If that would have sufficed, a set- 
tlement might have been effected years ago. 

In the third place, the very phrase "freedom of the 
seas" has a German sound. For what can this mean ? 
Germany has always had freedom of the seas so far as 
her commerce and legitimate pursuits are concerned. 
She has been restricted on the seas only in the matter of 
attacking England. The European arrangement has, of 
course, been for Germany to maintain supremacy on the 
land while England maintained supremacy on the sea, 
an arrangement entirely equitable owing to the charac- 
ter of the two nations. But since the Franco-Prussian 
war Germany has insisted upon being supreme upon 
both land and sea, a program which, of course, was aimed 
at England. It was this unreasonable demand upon the 



THE POPE AND THE WAR 95 

part of Germany, that she dominate both sea and land, 
which nullified The Hague conferences and brought to 
nothing the repeated attempts on the part of England to 
secure a limitation of armaments. 

So to Germany the freedom of the seas means noth- 
ing except that she be allowed such domination, 
since she has always had freedom of every other 
sort. And when this suspicious phrase was discovered 
in the proposal of the Pope, it caused suspicion in- 
stantly. 

These fundamental defects were reenforced by many 
others. Eor example, why speak of disarmament with- 
out setting up some form of authority, in view of the 
historical facts that Germany has always rejected Eng- 
land's atempts to secure a limitation, that she has nulli- 
fied every Hague conference that has been held, and that 
she even refused to enter into peace treaties, which had 
been signed by all other nations? No acceptance of 
such a proposal could change the German attitude or 
government, and hence autocracy would only be per- 
petuated by its acceptance. In dealing with a power 
which refused point-blank to declare that it would re- 
spect its own treaty, and which later declared it to be 
a mere "scrap of paper," it is plain that something more 
substantial than agreements made with the same parties 
must be a condition of any lasting peace. 

'Now all of these things have been taken by the Al- 
lies to show that the Pope was not at heart really fa- 
vorable to their cause, and his enemies have not failed 
to turn every scrap of evidence against him. It is for 



96 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

this reason that any peace proposal which emanated 
from the Vatican was regarded with suspicion. 

I have pointed out that the Pope was able to ac- 
complish much, good in the war by securing a trans- 
fer of prisoners and other concessions. But in spite of 
what lie has done, the chances are all in favor of a 
further decline of his influence. There is a widespread 
dissatisfaction with the Church, and in Italy and France 
it is naturally directed against the Roman Catholic 
Church, just as in England it is against the Anglicans. 
As a matter of fact, Rome, in spite of her relation to 
the Church, is perhaps the most anti-papal city of Eu- 
rope. Here one may hear more outspoken protests 
against the Vatican than anywhere else — than in 
France, for example, where her influence has just been 
shaken off and where she is regarded with great sus- 
picion and reticence. This opposition is found in all 
ranks of society, from ministers of state down to waiters 
and carriage drivers. I was told by many people in 
Rome that the body of the late Pope could not be re- 
moved from its temporary tomb in St. Peter's to its final 
resting place in St. John Lateran because the Church 
feared a hostile demonstration on the part of the people. 

This attitude is toward the Church as an institution 
rather than against the Roman Catholic religion. In- 
deed, the very people who adopt it are good Catholics 
and may be seen regularly at worship in the Churches. 
The hostility is against the temporal pretensions of the 
Vatican, and in this direction it is quite intense. Com- 
paratively few communicants of the Church are mem- 




IRISH ANTI-CONSCRIPTION PLEDGE 



THE POPE AND THE WAR 97 

bers of the Clerical party, which is the instrument 
through which these temporal aspirations and agitations 
are kept alive. To the mass of the people the "Legge 
delle Guarantigie," the Law of Guarantees, by which 
Italy pledged herself to support, protect, and honor the 
Popes so long as they made Rome their home, is entirely 
satisfactory and they would by no means suffer its re- 
peal. But the Vatican steadily opposes this law and its 
party insists upon a recognition of temporal power; 
therefore the sum set aside for papal support has never 
been drawn and the Pope considers himself a prisoner, 
although the inconsistency of accepting the Vatican, Lat- 
eran palace, the villa at Castel Gandolfo, and protec- 
tion for conclaves and assemblies is practiced. And re- 
cently the antagonism between the Vatican and the gov- 
ernment has been made more acute on account of the 
protests of the Pope against being subjected to delays 
and restraints, especially in the matter of messages and 
couriers, which are imposed upon all persons, even gov- 
ernmental officials, by military regulations. There was 
also a complaint that the diplomatic representatives of 
Germany and Austria accredited to the Holy See had 
been forced to leave Rome, although this is vigorously 
denied by the government. 

In all of these political movements, the Church is 
sadly injuring her own cause and is gradually alienating 
her own people. In every issue the masses take the side 
of the state and the breach between them and the Church 
is thereby widened. But this does not mean that Protes- 
tantism is growing accordingly. Protestantism seldom 



98 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

makes any advances as the result of agitation against or 
dissatisfaction with Romanism; this agitation usually 
has a political basis, and if it succeeds in alienating any 
persons from Rome it usually embitters them also 
against all other Churches. Protestantism is tolerably 
influential in Italy and is respected ; it carries on a mis- 
sionary and educational activity that is of great value. 
But aside from the Waldensians, it does its best work 
among the foreign population. Atheism is growing far 
more rapidly than Protestantism, if we can trust the 
statistics. These show that there are only 123,253 Prot- 
estants in Italy, while the avowed Atheists number 874,- 
532. There are 563,404 persons who refuse to state 
their religious preferences, and these are claimed by all 
sides : the Catholics declare they are Romanists who de- 
pend for employment upon the Socialists, while on the 
other hand it is declared that they are Weak-kneed 
Protestants who fear the Catholic majority. When it 
is remembered that the outspoken Catholics number 
33,000,000, it is easy to see that Protestantism has 
made small progress. 

The work of Protestantism in Italy is now mainly 
a testing of the open Bible theory through a wonderful 
distribution of copies of the JSTew Testament to the sol- 
diers and the people generally. The various foreign and 
local Bible societies have recently given away a million 
copies of the Scriptures, many of them very elegant edi- 
tions with copious notes and explanations, and this work 
is proceeding with much system and rapidity. At first 
this activity met with stern resistance on the pari of the 



THE POPE AND THE WAR 99 

Roman clergy, and they caused the government to 
challenge the Protestants to show cause why it should 
not be stopped, at least so far as the armies were 
concerned. Fortunately, the societies were able to prove 
that the people were demanding the Scriptures by show- 
ing thousands of letters, mostly from soldiers, expressing 
gratitude for the Testament, requesting one, or asking 
that a copy be sent to wives. Such evidence was so over- 
whelming that the Protestants were allowed to proceed 
with their work. And it also forced the Catholics to 
make some concessions and to issue a version of the 
Scriptures themselves. But the people prefer the other 
version and regard the Catholic with suspicion, and the 
fact of its being issued has given them a greater liberty 
in accepting what is offered to them from the other side. 
The Protestants have always considered this to be a 
fundamental work of propaganda. This faith has con- 
tended that the open Bible is its main support, and that 
only a free acquaintance with it is necessary to secure 
the conversion of the people. If this be true, then it 
stands to reap great results from such a general distribu- 
tion. But wholly aside from the possibility or desir- 
ability of such results, there can be little doubt that the 
movement will issue in great good educationally. And it 
is already causing a reaction upon Catholicism which 
will make that faith more liberal, and this will also be 
great gain. In justice to the distributors it should be 
said that they are not actuated by any proselyting mo- 
tives, but are carrying on their work purely for benevo- 
lent reasons; the leading spirits among them are men 



100 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

whose Churches have no missions in Italy. One can 
hardly forecast the future of Protestantism as a result 
of this activity ; but at any rate it will put to an adequate 
test the doctrine that the Bible in the hands of the peo- 
ple will eventually mean their acceptance of a more 
spiritual type of religion. 

The nature of the Protestant religion which prevails 
in Italy is that of a moderate orthodoxy, a brand which 
is not up to the liberal ideas of America and England 
but which does not go in for the fantastic notions of me- 
dieval orthodoxy, like pre-millenarianism, for ex- 
ample, which we sometimes find in these countries. The 
faith is very uncritical and unscientific, for the modern 
historical spirit has not yet reached Italy. When this 
spirit does begin to affect the religious life it will make 
an immediate difference, but from a purely pragmatic 
and practical standpoint it is doubtful whether this dif- 
ference will immediately redound to the advantage of 
religion. On the contrary, it may drive the uninformed 
orthodox back to Catholicism, which cannot be expected 
to change. And to some it may seem like a concession 
to rationalism. 

Conditions in Italy are remarkably like they were 
in America during the days of Ingersoll, who based 
his entire propaganda upon an idea of the Bible 
which has since been entirely corrected by historical 
scholarship. Ingersoll would have no message in Amer- 
ica, to-day, but in Italy he would be a power of destruc- 
tion against the Church. To-day the Italian rationalists 
are carrying on the same kind of agitation, seizing and 



THE POPE AND THE WAR 101 

turning against religion the contradictions, the imperfect 
morality, and the differing ideas of the Bible. The his- 
torical spirit, with its doctrines of the gradualness of 
revelation, dynamic inspiration, and composite character 
of the Bible, will utterly destroy all this as a basis for 
the rejection of religion, but it will require some time for 
these ideas to take hold upon the consciousness of the 
people. At first, as in America, it will seem like conced- 
ing all the claims of rationalism; and the opposition 
with which it will be met by the clergy will lend counte- 
nance to this view. This has been the effect of such 
short-sighted opposition the world over. Yet nothing 
can stop this spirit, since it expresses fundamental 
truth. And in opposing it the clergy have always been 
the real enemies of the Bible and of the religion founded 
upon it ; they have despised the greatest apologetic value 
of all time, after all other apologetics have lost their 
force. 

So from this standpoint one may question whether 
there be not ground for the Catholic contention that it is 
dangerous to place the open Bible in the hands of the 
people. It is indeed dangerous if we are to place it be- 
fore them and at the same time involve them in the old 
doctrines of verbal inspiration and literalness. For this 
will mean a repetition of the sad history of the last few 
years. They will get a view of it which cannot stand 
the light of criticism, and when the principles of criti- 
cism begin to dawn upon them they will think their Bible 
is gone, nevermore to be trusted. They will be under 
the necessity of either holding to their literal notions 



102 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

and rejecting science and history, or of accepting the 
tenets of scholarship and giving up their ideas about the 
Bible — and this latter course, for the common man, will 
likely mean giving up his Bible in more cases than other- 
wise. Therefore, one of the most urgent needs in the 
religious world is for a general and popular educational 
movement which will clarify the ideas of the people as 
to the nature of the Bible, its contents, and its inspira- 
tion. Otherwise the people must continue to fight ration- 
alism with broken blades. 

So far as the Roman Catholic Church itself is con- 
cerned, we may be quite sure that she will survive. Ma- 
caulay said that this Church would be living when a 
New Zealander stood upon a broken arch of the London 
Bridge and sketched the ruins of St. Paul's, and Tyrrel 
remarked that when she dies other faiths may order their 
coffins. These comments state the case now. And yet, 
while it is unthinkable that Rome should perish, it is 
almost as certain that the world will not turn back to 
her communion. The Reformation laid hold upon the 
best blood and brain of the world, and from that time the 
drift away from Rome has been constant. This will 
never turn towards her again unless she makes changes 
that no man can safely prophesy she will ever make. 
Yet this is not to say that she is doomed ; far from it. 
She has elements of strength which will enable her to 
survive, and elements of truth which make her salva- 
tion possible. It has recently been said that a man is 
a poor Christian who is not attracted by the worship of 
the Catholic Church. The beauty of her ritual, her 



THE POPE AND THE WAR 103 

connection with the past, her wonderful possessions, and 
the steadiness with which she adheres to her traditional 
positions all make an appeal to us. But in spite of this, 
there are few non-Catholics who would prefer to be- 
come her communicants. 

Yet the greatest opportunity in the realm of religion 
to-day is possessed by the Roman Catholic Church. 
The Protestant divisions, lack of centralization, in- 
definiteness of doctrine, absence of authority, lax 
and lowering standards, laxity in government — all of 
these things contribute to the weakness of Protestantism. 
Yet in these same things lies the strength of Catholi- 
cism. Especially does her form of government add to 
her power, and the fidelity with which she has adhered 
to her doctrines cannot but command admiration, even 
from those who do not agree with her interpretations. 
It has been rightly said that Rome has added to the 
faith and has corrupted it, but she cannot be accused of 
having forsaken it. And so it seems plain that if Rome 
would consent to make the adaptations demanded by the 
spirit of the age, she would come into a new influence. 

These, adaptations would have to run the entire course 
of her life. In the very first place it would be necessary 
to renounce all the claims to temporal authority, to ac- 
cept, and even to immensely modify, the Italian Law 
of Guarantees, to overthrow the meaningless fiction of 
the "prisoner of the Vatican," and to take her place in 
the world as a purely spiritual force. That action would 
have to be accompanied by a radical change of heart and 
attitude toward the entire question of scholarship, espe- 



104 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

cially as it affects the Bible and the doctrines of the 
Church. This would mean the overthrow of the author- 
ity of the Church in matters of dogma, the upsetting of 
the entire range of traditions which are unsupported, 
the opening of the minds of all people to whatever light 
may be in the world, and the beginning of a new educa- 
tional method among them. The world believes, no 
matter how strongly the Church may protest, that Rome 
deliberately keeps her people in ignorance in so far as 
she may; this belief stands on the basis of the his- 
torical fact that her religion is purest where she is com- 
paratively weakest, and that education is not enhanced 
and furthered where she is in absolute control. 

When such reconstructions have been made and the 
world is aware that Rome has entered upon a new policy 
which will concern itself wholly with the spiritual af- 
fairs of life, stands for progress in all matters of doctrine 
and knowledge, and places upon morality an importance 
which she has never stressed, then the strength of her 
organization, her fidelity, and the wonderful richness of 
her worship will assert itself with telling force. On that 
basis she can come into her own and dominate the world ; 
on the present basis it is clear to be seen that she has no 
prospects other than continued opposition, the total de- 
struction of her political ambitions, and a gradual and 
constant decline of influence. 

But will Rome consent to make the adaptations? 
Of this there seems to be no hope. She has displayed 
a deplorable blindness to the ongoing of all the forces 
of civilization through the centuries, and this has been 



THE POPE AND THE WAR 105 

her greatest handicap. It seems a little too much to 
expect that this war has opened her eyes. And this situ- 
ation may well cause one interested in the religious 
welfare of the world to he sad. There is nothing over 
which such a person might so well weep. That the 
Roman Catholic Church, the Church of the martyrs, 
the saints, and the fathers of our religion, the possessor 
of most of the art treasures of the world, the heir of all 
the sentiment and prestige which history can hestow 
upon any institution, should insist upon the crystalliza- 
tion and perpetuation of ideas derived from the middle 
ages and ignore the advances of the world, thereby 
bringing about her own impotence as a moral power on 
earth — this is a condition which even the most ardent 
Protestant must heartily regret. 



CHAPTEK V 

THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION IN THE WAS 

One would have expected that the great European 
war, as it spread death, devastation, and bereavement 
over the world, would have called the minds of the peo- 
ple to reality and to matters of eternity, thus bringing 
them around to religion. We have for centuries educat- 
ed the people to rely upon religion in times of great 
crises, and we have been so successful in our tutoring 
that multitudes of them never rely upon it in any other 
times; in line with all the religious ideas which we 
have inculcated, the people should have flocked to the 
Churches when they heard the dread sound of the tocsin 
of war. This was what the religious world expected the 
people to do, and preparations were made for a sweep- 
ing revival of spirituality. Books were written for the 
purpose of outlining the situation from the religious 
viewpoint, and the Church made ready the forces of en- 
couragement and conservation. During the first few 
months of the war all signs pointed to the fact that these 
expectations were to be abundantly fulfilled. The peo- 
ple flocked to the Churches in ever-increasing streams, 
they resorted to prayer with much constancy, and they 
gave all evidences of a quickening religious life. In 

106 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 107 

these months it appeared certain that a great revival 
was imminent. 

But this early religious awakening was founded on 
fear, and fear is a motive that cannot long support an 
intelligent faith. Some years ago I had occasion to in- 
vestigate the records of a little church which was located 
in the heart of the district devastated by the great New 
Madrid earthquake of 1812, and these ancient records 
showed that before the earthquake the church had but 27 
members, immediately after it there were 165, and a 
year later the membership had shrunk to its original 
figure. Thus it has always been with religious fervor 
that sprang from fear, and thus it was during the first 
months of the great war. When the first fear and dread 
produced by the war had passed, when people were 
able to think calmly, and especially when the fervor of 
patriotism had caught them and avenues were opened 
through which their energies could be used for the com- 
fort of the soldiers, the superficial religious sentiments 
passed also, much to the disappointment of those who 
had desired a renaissance of evangelism and spirituality. 

Perhaps the fault was with these very people who 
most desired a religious awakening, for they utterly 
failed to adapt their message and their program to the 
needs of the time; they committed the blunder of be- 
lieving that the same message which these people had 
spurned in times of peace would suffice to hold them in 
time of war. In this they were much mistaken, as the 
entire social and spiritual history of these warring times 
has shown conclusively. The religious leaders should 



108 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

have known better; perhaps they did know better, but 
the crisis was upon them, so suddenly that they were 
unable to make the necessary adaptations, showing that 
they had no real grasp on the entire problem of religion 
as it applies to life. At any rate, they should now know 
better than to attempt to hold the people after the war 
with the same old platitudes which the people had 
ignored before the war, and which they have tried and 
rejected during the war. 

To-day the person traveling through the warring 
countries will certainly see no signs of a religious awak- 
ening; even the religious specialist who investigates in- 
tensively will not be able to discover them. In all of the 
cities vice is more rampant than ever, the people are as 
little concerned with eternal matters, and the Church 
faces the same problems of sin and indifference. Evil 
habits, such as cigarette smoking, liquor drinking, pro- 
fanity, and sexual immorality, are steadily increasing 
and are enjoying a popularity which makes them diffi- 
cult to denounce; as a result they are not denounced, 
even many chaplains palliating and excusing them to a 
large extent. By selecting detached instances of conver- 
sion, the workers encourage themselves to believe that 
religious sentiments are growing, but the general situa- 
tion, and even their own observations and statistics, do 
not give foundations for their belief. I went to Europe 
for the purpose of making social and moral investiga- 
tions, resolved to get the truth from all angles. I asso- 
ciated with the religious leaders and workers, with uni- 
versity professors and their students, with soldiers and 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 109 

officers in the army, with governmental officials and the 
men on the street^ endeavoring to avoid the common mis- 
take of the theologians and preachers who look at facts 
from their own angle and leave out of account facts that 
do not come within their immediate range of interests. 
Such an investigation will surely reveal that the re- 
ligious outlook in Europe is not bright, and that few 
people are trying to make it appear bright. All classes 
are fully aware that the world faces a crisis in her re- 
ligious and moral life. 

It is not that people are no longer religious. It is 
rather that they are confused in the face of all the facts 
with which religion is presumed to deal. They are con- 
fused, in the first place, in regard to the function and 
the efficacy of prayer. People never prayed so much 
as they did at the .beginning of hostilities; people who 
had never prayed before resorted to the holy exercise 
then. But what did their prayers avail ? The war went 
on and men were killed just the same. And there were 
no distinctions. The son of the man who prayed for the 
boy's safety day and night fell by the side of the lad 
whose friends recognized no God to whom they could 
pray. Agonizings meant nothing in the face of the 
scourge of war. Then there came the thought that both 
sides were praying for victory to the same God, both 
relying upon the same God to further their success. 
There were heathen alliances on both sides, and mingled 
with the petitions to God there were pleadings with vari- 
ous pagan deities. Yet none of them responded to the 
appeals of their followers. In the midst of it all there 



110 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

was confusion and uncertainty. What, then, is the good 
of prayer ? [Who and where is God ? Perhaps there is 
no God after all ! Such doubtings affected people in all 
stations. "There's Bill," said the soldier, " 'e prayed 
like 'ell and got 'is bloomin' 'ead blowed off." 

The trouble with the people is not far to seek, of 
course, and a trained theologian might discover it at 
once. They had an antiquated doctrine of prayer. They 
understood that its primary function was to secure fa- 
vors and things from God, that it has an objective effect 
by securing a special Providence for the elect who resort 
to it or have it resorted to for them. This is founded, 
of course, on a misconception of the nature of God and 
His dealing with men. "They think," says a chaplain, 
"that religion is mostly concerned with self -saving. 
They tend to recognize most easily the signs of God's 
favor in this or that instance of safety or escape." A 
soldier on the Somme, who had fallen on the field, gave 
to his chaplain a copy of the 91st Psalm, with the remark 
that it was his handbook. "Yet by itself," says the 
padre, "the 91st Psalm, though a wonderful expression 
of trust in God, promises a security to which our Lord, 
and others akin to Him in spirit, have not put their seal. 
He did not ask — He resisted the temptation to ask — 
that no evil should happen to Him, nor that angels 
should bear Him in their hands lest he should hurt His 
foot against a stone. He would not have men set their 
face in the day of battle in the assurance that, though a 
thousand should fall beside them and ten thousand at 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 111 

their right hand, the same lot should not come nigh 
them." 

The right minded person who resorted to prayer as a 
spiritual exercise, as communion with the Infinite, and 
for the purpose of securing its subjective benefits of 
comfort, hope, and strength encountered no such stress 
of heart in the emergency. And the theologian would 
want to inform all others that their difficulty was not 
with prayer but with a misconception of it. But it 
must be remembered that the people are holding the doc- 
trine that has been taught them, and they have more 
right to abuse the theologian than the theologian has to 
abuse them. The lofty theory of prayer as communion 
conferring subjective benefits has not been understood by 
the rank and file ; we can, in fact, say that it is not the 
doctrine of the Church. As Mr. H. G. Wells says, the 
doctrine of prayer as a process of begging God for spe- 
cial favors would not be admitted by the Hibbert Jour- 
nal, but it is freely proclaimed by the parish leaflet ; and 
the leaflet, rather than the Hibbert Journal, establishes 
the standard of ideas for the rank and file. This war 
has sufficed to destroy the faith of people in prayer as 
thus understood, and since the multitudes have difficulty 
in reaching a more spiritual understanding they have be- 
come involved in doubt and obscurity. From this con- 
fusion here there must issue a more spiritual type of 
faith, just as a spiritual religion must issue from simi- 
lar confusions in other departments. 

The prevailing state of intellectual confusion in re- 
gard to religion is caused further by the uncertainty as 



112 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

to the exact status of Christianity at the present time. 
When the war broke out there was a wide-spread cry 
that Christianity had failed and been discredited, and 
since the fact of the war was directly opposed to the 
principles of our faith many people were not able to 
preserve their hope in the final triumph of the kingdom. 
The rationalist press, aided and abetted by the repre- 
sentatives of isms and cults of various kinds, labored 
assiduously to spread such doubts and to make the roar 
of the war serve as the requiem of our religion. As the 
war progressed the discontent with the Church began 
to spread and the clergy fell more and more into dis- 
repute. All of this tended to fasten upon the minds of 
the people a fear or a belief that Christianity had finally 
broken down and would ultimately be discarded. This 
thought found lodgment in the breasts of some of the 
most devout people, and the ensuing confusion has 
worked much to the detriment of religion. 

Perhaps the trouble here lies in the fact that we have 
no well-defined doctrine or conception of teleology. We 
do not know exactly where the world is going or where it 
ought to go. Even to-day most Christians have no under- 
standing of the kingdom of God, its elements or the proc- 
esses of its achievements. Premillenarians have taught 
that the world must go to hell before the kingdom comes ; 
others have understood our gospel to be wholly personal 
and the kingdom to be a heaven in which saved persons 
are to be taken ; still others have had visions of a social 
kingdom and have urged a social service activity of a 
superficial kind as the sum of all Christian ideals. But 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 113 

neither school has worked out its doctrines into a system- 
atic theology, or even # given a program that could ap- 
peal to the religious needs of the world or of the indi- 
vidual life. The old theology set the standard for such 
uncertainty, for it failed to give its devotees a reasonable 
doctrine of teleology. It pictured a perfect world, then 
the fall of man and the world into sin, then a long proc-« 
ess of coming back to perfection, then the end of the 
order. In this scheme there was no moral evolution, 
since the highest hope of the race was to get back to the 
point from which it started. It worked in a circle. So 
we really had no vital doctrine of teleology, and in this 
situation one can scarcely blame Bergson for making a 
philosophy and leaving it out altogether. 

It is, indeed, a difficult task to harmonize the Chris- 
tian doctrine of a coming social kingdom with our ideas 
of a Christian personal life. In fact, it cannot be done 
at all on the basis of the old ideas of authority and literal 
interpretation. The hearts of millions are thrilling to- 
day at the thought of a coming kingdom, and such peo- 
ple can behold the war as the leading factor in such a 
kingdom. The war will mean the destruction of autoc- 
racy and the enthronement of democracy, the reign of 
brotherhcL^ and equality; it will mean a new world, a 
better civilization, a new appreciation of the spiritual 
ideas of freedom and justice, a better evaluation of man. 
!N*o person has difficulty in thinking that the war will 
mean this. But nearly all of us have difficulty in believ- 
ing that this is Christianity. In a dim sort of way we 
understand that Christ would be pleased to have such a 



114 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

world, and that we will have gone a long way in the 
general direction of His social kingdom when this comes 
to pass. Yet we hesitate to proclaim that this awful 
war is Christ's method of ushering in His kingdom, and 
when one does have the courage to thus proclaim we are 
somewhat shocked even though we know he is telling 
the truth. Our trouble is that we are in a strait between 
the doctrine of a social kingdom and the doctrine of a 
personal life. We want to preserve both, yet we hesi- 
tate to make either supreme. In after years, when the 
horrors of this conflict have passed away and its benefits 
have been realized, perhaps we shall understand. Per- 
haps we shall then see that men are not so valuable as 
principles, and that great civilizing movements are 
worth what they cost. This is the doctrine of Christ. 
It was on this platform that He taught, lived, and died ; 
His history will bear no other interpretation. 

"We must not confuse patriotism with Christianity nor 
make Christ an international politician ; but we can be- 
lieve that the kingdom will not come until the doctrines 
which were incarnate in the German Empire, doctrines 
of force, autocracy, ruthlessness, barbarism, have been 
eradicated once for all. And when these ideas take 
physical shape they can only be met physically. It in- 
volves us in contradictions, uncertainties, anxiety, and 
doubt, to be sure, but it is no time for Christians to be 
discouraged or to admit that their religion has been 
discredited. 

Along the same line we meet the fact that the war has 
bred sentiments so different from religious sentiments 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 115 

that these have added to the confusion and the discard- 
ing of religion. And here we are not able to make any 
defense or adjustment ; we can simply plead the frailty 
of human flesh. The person who goes from a neutral 
country, or even from America at the present time, to 
any of the belligerent nations of Europe will be amazed 
at the hatred which flames everywhere. The Germans 
have not been the only ones to sing a "Hymn of Hate" ; 
the French have done the same, and so have others, al- 
though they have not been so deliberate nor so frenzied 
in their hatred as the Germans. Eacial antagonism of 
the most bitter type has overthrown all sentiments of 
brotherhood as they applied to other nations. Murder 
and blood are in the air. Immorality has become so 
flagrant that its very commonness has robbed it of its 
repulsion, and a general lowering of the moral tone has 
resulted. Liquor drinking, vulgarity, profanity, and 
sexual looseness are tolerated with the utmost compla- 
cency. "I never knew a chaplain," a soldier can write, 
"to refuse his drink, his cigarette, or to sit in a little 
game/' and when a clergyman scatters "damns" through 
a book which he publishes no one thinks of complaining. 
These sentiments, and others like them, are not the senti- 
ments of religion, yet they are the prevailing sentiments 
of the day. And religion suffers accordingly, for the peo- 
ple seem to understand that it is no time to attempt re- 
ligion seriously, so far at least as its stricter morality is 
concerned. 

They are quite aware that to be religious would mean 
that such sentiments were to be set aside, and even would 



116 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

have to be opposed. Therefore they let religion go, since 
few are in a condition of mind to attempt a strenuous op- 
position. In fact, to be religious in Europe to-day seems 
to many people to imply a task too large to be attempted. 
One may well hesitate, for example, before he urges a 
solution of the problems raised by the scourge of im- 
morality which has swept Europe. To be sure, to use 
chaste language, to refuse to gamble, to be a total ab- 
stainer from intoxicants, to keep the Sabbath, to pray 
night and morning, to protest wickedness — to do these 
things in the armies to-day would require as much cour- 
age as the martyrs possessed. It is too big a job to be 
religious, so religion can be set aside until after the war 
— this seems to be the attitude. And it is heightened by 
the fact that it seems to prevail in the minds of the re- 
ligious leaders of the world. The Church preaches no 
vital morality to-day, and many of the chaplains in the 
army stand ready to palliate the moral delinquencies of 
the soldiers, to excuse and even defend them. And this 
has the double effect of confirming the men in their sins 
and at the same time causing them to lose respect for 
their religious leaders. 

The religious situation among the soldiers themselves 
is perhaps more important than the general situation as 
it pertains to the churches, because of the number of 
men under arms and because their popularity will give 
them the power to shape the controlling ideas of the fu- 
ture. One cannot, of course, state the soldier's attitude 
toward religion in a word ; it is undefinable and it varies 
with different men and in different situations. Speaking 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 117 

very broadly, perhaps we may say that trie average sol- 
dier neither knows nor cares much for religion. He 
"carries on" in accordance with his own desires and 
tastes. In a general way he is interested in the talks 
at the welfare hut, but if nothing were there but the 
talks he would not darken its door. He smokes and 
swears day in and day out, nor thinks his profanity an 
offense to God. When the time comes to "go out" he be- 
comes very serious, reads his Testament, thinks of home, 
and prays ; if he comes back alive his seriousness gives 
way and he "carries on" as usual. It is impossible for 
one who is interested in the future of religion, and who 
wants to see a revival of spirituality, to obtain much 
comfort from the religious attitude of the soldiers in the 
field to-day. Detached instances of faithfulness and 
conversion are, of course, recorded, but no general spirit 
of evangelism is evident. 

There appears an attempt in some quarters to deny 
this, and to make out that this war has given great impe- 
tus to religion, but when one investigates these attempts 
he will soon see that it can be accomplished only by 
denaturing religion, separating it from morality, and 
making it synonymous with patriotism and courage. Ac- 
cording to the most reliable statistics we have, only 20 
per cent, of the men now under arms had any con- 
nection with the Church before the war, and half of the 
number have fallen away from their ideals and are not 
now classed as Christians. 

In the name of religion a protest should be uttered 
against a prevalent charity and forbearance on the part 



118 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

of clergymen which goes to the length of excusing sins. 
It is not necessary to he uncharitable or to underestimate 
the strength of temptation when one lives an unnatural 
life in order to hold to moral standards. The men who 
adopt such an attitude are the real enemies of religion, 
and they are failing to be the real friends of the hoys. 
A distressing feature of our religious life for the last 
generation has been the fact that the Church has lowered 
her standards, and we will suffer immeasurably if we 
allow millions of men to return from the battle field with 
ideas that immorality does not matter much, that it is 
not condemned by those who speak for religion and the 
Church. Whatever happens to us, we must not forget 
that it is wrong to sin. 

Allied to this error is a disposition on the part of 
these same religious leaders to make a religion out of ele- 
ments that are not religious, at least that are not dis- 
tinctly Christian. Thus we are told that the men are 
really religious, although they may not know it ; they do 
not know much about God and Christ and spirituality, 
but they display superhuman courage, they are unsel- 
fish, they are cheerful, they are brotherly, they are pa- 
triots. These are admirable traits to be sure, and men 
will not be very religious without them, but their pos- 
session is compatible with the rankest infidelity and sin- 
fulness. Sherwood Eddy says the men have five virtues 
— courage, brotherliness, generosity, straightforward- 
ness, and cheerfulness — and five moral weaknesses — im- 
purity, obscenity and profanity, drunkenness, gambling, 
and a lack of moral courage. Eew people will really be- 



•THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 119 

lieve that there is much vital religion represented by the 
five virtues as long as the five vices exist. It must be 
remembered that there has never been a war, even among 
the worst pagans, when men did not display courage and 
patriotism, and the inevitable conclusion seems to be 
that no Christianity is needed to produce these things. 
And yet some of our modern chaplains make them the 
very essence of our religion; chaplains, so says Eddy, 
have widely preached the idea that death in battle saves. 
("With Our Soldiers in France." Chap, vii.) 

The following statement from a chaplain seems a 
frank and fair statement of the religious situation among 
the soldiers : "There is not a great revival of the Chris- 
tian religion at the front. Deep in their hearts is a great 
trust and faith in God. It is an inarticulate faith ex-. 
pressed in deeds. The top levels, as it were, of their con- 
sciousness, are much filled with grumbling and foul 
language and physical occupations ; but beneath lie deep 
spiritual springs, whence issue their cheerfulness, stub- 
bornness, patience, generosity, humility, and willingness 
to suffer and to die. There is religion about ; only, very 
often it is not the Christian religion. Rather it is natu- 
ral religion. It is the expression of a craving for se- 
curity. Literally it is a looking for salvation." Here 
is* a situation which is charged with promise if it could 
be met fully and frankly. The first step should be to 
translate this natural religion into Christianity, for this 
so-called "natural religion" rife in our society to-day 
furnishes the animus of most of the attacks upon the 
Church and Christianity. It is everywhere issuing in 



120 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

materialism, and if these soldiers return with this de- 
tached and undefined sentiment it will bode no good for 
our social order. It does not deserve the praise that is 
being heaped upon it. 

The fact that it is not Christian is not really the fault 
of the men ; rather is it the fault of those whom we have 
sent to be the religious guides of the men. They have 
lowered standards and been content with too little, 
thereby practicing a deception upon the men themselves. 
They come from the Church, but the men feel that the 
Church cares nothing for them, and while they revere 
Christ they identify the Christian Church with a re- 
spectability that is not unlike the Phariseeism that 
Christ denounced. The problem that is before us at 
the present time is to make the world understand that 
our religion, as the Church interprets it, comes from 
Christ — and this means that our interpretation must be 
changed. "I am sure," says a chaplain, "that the soldier 
has got religion, I am sure that he has Christianity ; but 
he does not know he has Christianity." The task is to 
make him know he has Christianity, that our religion, 
stripped of the extraneous ideas we have wrapped about 
it, embodies all the things which he regards as high, holy, 
and noble. Our danger is that we will so lower our stand- 
ards that our religion will be emasculated by its friends, 
that the soldiers will reject it, and that they will come 
back with their "natural religion," their religion that is 
not moral, and fasten upon us materialism, unbelief, 
and a shadowy semblance of idealism that goes under 
the name of spirituality and faith. 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 121 

Eeligion will survive this war, but it may not be the 
same kind of religion we have had — and that may be a 
ground of hope. Men are learning that experiences 
come in which they cannot escape God, and never have 
they felt such a need of Him in the soul. And we have 
faith to believe that this religion will be the Christian 
religion. But reconstructions of the most radical sort 
will have to be made if we are to catch up in the breast 
of the Church the religious sentiments of humanity and 
use the Church to give them expression in the service of 
the race. It is too much to say at this time that the 
reconstructions can be easily made ; we are not able at 
the present time to tell what will be demanded. The 
indications are not satisfactory, this we know. Itiseems 
likely that the new turn of religious affairs, the recon- 
structions necessary, will be opposed by the Church. 
It has opposed such changes before, and in so doing it 
has been its own worst enemy. Already it is being 
charged with getting ready to preach after the war the 
same old platitudes which it preached before the war. 
If it does this we may safely predict that the breach 
between itself and the people — already wide — will be 
broadened. Strong forces on the other side are striving 
for that very thing, seeking to make the people still 
more discontented with the Church, their hope being to 
establish this "natural religion," with neither organiza- 
tion nor priesthood — with nothing but a "finite God." 
But can this be done? What will happen to the re- 
ligious and moral interests of society when it has no or- 
ganization through which to express its faith in action, 



122 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

and when its God has shrunk to the size of Mr. Wells' 
deity ? The proceeding has always failed ; it has always 
resulted in confusion, despair, ignorance, and crime. 
Our God must be bigger, not smaller. And, in some 
form or other, the Church must be preserved to height- 
en, to propagate, and to express the spiritual sentiments 
of the heart of humanity. 

There has been a vast deal of speculation and theory 
expended on the matter of the soldier's attitude toward 
the Church and religion, and the learned conclusions 
have given great joy to the rationalists and anxiety to 
the Churchman. Most of the time and sentiment thus 
devoted might well have been spared if persons had 
borne in mind that the soldier is simply the average 
young man whom we have always known. The young 
man never was very religious and never had any close 
connection with the Church, and since donning his uni- 
form he remains the same kind of person. Why should 
the Church be so concerned over his attitude to-day when 
she did not seem to care about him yesterday? Why 
does the rationalist cry out that the Church must die 
because the soldiers are not in its membership when the 
same fact afforded him no comfort when the soldier 
wore his "civics" ? The Church is in no greater danger 
now from this source than she has always been ; indeed 
the Church is much better established in this quarter, 
for although the war has not converted the soldier it has 
made him more appreciative of the real values in social 
life. 

When a person returns to America after an experi- 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 123 

ence with the American forces in the field he is at once 
subjected to a cross-examination concerning the morals 
and general behavior of the soldiers. He can tell in ad- 
vance what the questions are to be: Are the men re- 
ligious as they go under fire ? Do they drink, gamble, 
swear, or practice immorality in the towns and villages ? 
Are they becoming degenerates or will they return with 
higher moral conceptions than when they went away? 
These and similar questions are fired at one from all 
sides. Every social institution which we have seems 
planning for big things when the boys come home. The 
Church seems especially interested in their .welfare at 
the present time. This is a thing which the men them- 
selves seem unable to appreciate, for they are well aware 
that the Church took no extraordinary interest in them 
when they were at home, in civilian life. But now that 
duty has called them and they have responded, when 
they are displaying a courage, a self-sacrifice, a devo- 
tion, and an unselfishness the like of which the world 
never knew before, the Church at once becomes extreme- 
ly solicitous for their moral welfare. JSTow the Amer- 
ican soldier is the wisest person imaginable. It is ab- 
solutely impossible to "fool" him about anything. He 
detects insincerity and camouflage instantly. He re- 
sents flattery in all its forms. He is alive to all that is 
going on about him, and woe unto that organization or 
institution which seeks to capitalize his influence or 
build upon him after the war. He has a passion for 
genuineness, he hates shams, he despises narrowness and 
littleness with his whole soul. Therefore, it might as 



124 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

well be said very plainly that the newly-born interest 
of the religious forces of the country in the soldier will 
benefit said forces little unless it be coupled with a re- 
construction of doctrine, message, methods, and life. 

I think I can set forth in a few words the gen- 
eral character of the American soldier overseas, as com- 
pared with the young men we have always known at 
home. The man overseas is an inveterate cigarette 
smoker and the most profane individual to be found any- 
where — this is the worst that can be said of him. In 
this regard he is much worse than he was at home, if we 
consider cigarette smoking and profanity as vices, or 
even as bad habits. But he does not drink very much, he 
is seldom seen under the influence of liquor, he gambles 
a little, and. he does not indulge in sexual immorality 
to any large degree. In these details he is a better man 
than he was at home, better than the young man who is 
still in civilian life. This about sums up the situation. 
The soldier has little opportunity to commit sins other 
than those named; in fact those of the fighting armies 
have little chance to commit sins of any kind. 

In regard to the profanity of the soldier, there is 
little to be said in defense of it. This is the most fool- 
ish and inexcusable of all bad habits which human flesh 
is heir to, but it is practically universal in our army. 
I have had a wide association with men of all the allied 
armies, and I say without hesitation that our men are 
the worst "cussers" in Europe. They swear without any 
provocation; in their ordinary conversation they punc- 
tuate their remarks with an elaborate and artistic array 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 125 

of oaths. And they are teaching the French to use our 
American swear-words also; it is nothing unusual to 
hear little boys and little girls bandying these expres- 
sions about on the streets. On one occasion when a 
young lady inquired the meaning of a certain vulgar 
word the soldier, covered with embarrassment, informed 
her that it meant "very nice," the same as "tres jolie"; 
and the result was that the young lady applied it to a 
medical officer who had kindly bandaged her finger. One 
day a ministerial Y. M. C. A. secretary gave a small tip 
to a French barber and received in return a smile and a 
"Thank you, s — I" In a certain sector great- 
strictness was being observed in regard to the pass word, 
and the report gained currency that the sentries had 
orders to fire without question on any person who did 
not immediately answer his challenge with the proper 
word. A young French lieutenant strayed out of his 
dug-out one night and was challenged by the soldier on 
guard. Instantly he remembered the situation and his 
blood froze within him at the prospect of instant death, 
for he was without the pass word, and he involuntarily 
ejaculated, "God damn." The sentry, who knew the 
man, was convulsed with laughter and said, "Pass, Lieu- 
tenant." Ever afterward the officer declared that he 
would use American oaths as long as he lived, because 
this expression had saved his life. 

On my first visit to the war zones I heard the British 
chaplains and welfare workers excusing their men for 
swearing, and I believed that this attitude constituted a 
distinct lowering of their moral ideas, out of motives 



126 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

of affection for the soldiers. But when I had lived inti- 
mately with the soldiers for several months I learned 
that in fact the habit did not argue any especial irrev- 
erence on the part of the men. The best of them do it ; 
even those who are active in religious matters are accom- 
plished "cussers." They are living under a mighty ten- 
sion, they feel deeply, and they have powerful thoughts ; 
nothing but the strongest language they can command 
is sufficient to express their sentiments. This, as nearly 
as I can determine, is the explanation of the prevalence 
of profanity. As hard as it may be for the average 
moralist to understand and appreciate the situation, it 
is nevertheless a fact that the soldier who swears so 
recklessly does not mean a word he says and has not the 
faintest idea of taking the name of the Deity in vain. 
For he loves and respects God, and has a powerful con- 
sciousness of His presence and power. 

One evening I was conducting a religious service, 
and the men had flocked in by hundreds, as they always 
do when conditions permit an assembly. I had a quar- 
tette of men who were to sing some of the familiar 
hymns. A fervent atmosphere of spirituality pervaded 
the place when the men arose to sing. There was no 
musical instrument and the men, in pitching their voices, 
struck a scale altogether too low. They uttered a few 
words and then stopped suddenly, and the leader re- 
marked, "O hell, that is too damned low!" The men 
seemed to take the remark as a matter of fact and it in 
no way spoiled the spirit of the occasion. 

There was a sergeant in a certain company who was 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 127 

unspeakably profane, and the chaplain had often de- 
clared his intention to "call down" the fellow. One 
day he was heard making the air blue behind the dug- 
out, and the chaplain seized the opportunity. But when 
he sought the sergeant's presence there was no oppor- 
tunity at all. The man was cursing a soldier who had 
in his possession a package of obscene postal cards, bear- 
ing pictures of a vile sort. The sergeant, with an ad- 
mirable string of oaths, was declaring that any soldier 
who would carry such pictures was a disgrace to the 
United States army, and in conclusion he took from his 
pocket a New Testament and remarked: "If you want 
to carry something why don't you get one of these 
damned Bibles; a man who carries one of these will 
never go far wrong." Naturally, the subject matter of 
his discourse disarmed the chaplain ! 

Those who for propaganda purposes or otherwise have 
been responsible for rumors to the effect that the Amer- 
ican soldiers in France are becoming addicted to the use 
of intoxicating liquors have been most unjust to these 
men and have rendered the country a distinct disservice. 
While the motives of those concerned were no doubt le- 
gitimate, the circulation of these reports tended to de- 
moralize our own spirit and to give aid and comfort to 
the enemy. Prom a close knowledge of the soldier in all 
the situations in which he ever finds himself, I can 
contradict the word of any man who accuses him of 
drunkenness. He does not drink to any appreciable de- 
gree; of the hundreds of thousands I have seen I can 
recall but three who showed any effects of drink. This 



128 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

is not to say that lie is a total abstainer; it is to say 
that he drinks far less over there than he did in civilian 
life at home. And the wines and beers that are used 
have been so "denatured" that they have little effect 
upon the drinker. The fighting forces at the front, offi- 
cers and men, are forbidden to buy champagne, although 
they can purchase the lighter drinks during certain hours 
of the day ; the villages are under martial law, and for 
the most part the men have their canteens filled with 
beer at the estaminet and consume it in the seclusion of 
their billets. All in all, the evils of intoxication among 
our overseas forces are so slight as to be almost negli- 
gible. 

And, without going into an unsavory subject or quot- 
ing meaningless statistics, the same is true of sexual im- 
morality. Venereal disease has been practically eradi- 
cated ; the problem is as nothing in comparison with the 
same problem in the camps and civilian population at 
home. The use of the prophylactic preventative has 
been largely responsible for this, it is true, yet the clean 
lives of the men is the leading element. In the very 
worst places, like Liverpool and other centers in Eng- 
land, and England is far worse than Erance, the infor- 
mation I received tended to establish the fact that about 
25 per cent, of the men received prophylactic each 
month, this including all the repeaters. Near the front 
lines in Erance the percentage drops until it practically 
disappears. The use of prophylactic has been the sub- 
ject of heated discussions pro and con, the antagonists 
insisting that it is a virtual encouragement of immoral 




AMERICAN LUMBERMEN IX THE SCOTCH HIGHLANDS 

THE FIRST CONTINGENT OF THE A. E. F. TO LAND OX EUROPEAN SOIL 




Y. M. C. A. HUT IN THE WOODS 

MILES FROM ANY TOWN OR HABITATION 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 129 

practices by an offer of protection on the part of the 
government. However this may be, its use has reduced 
disease almost to the vanishing point. 

The leading preventative of immorality among the 
men is their own strong moral consciousness, very 
marked and easily discerned. But this consciousness is 
not narrow and does not concern itself with trivial de- 
tails. They have denned it themselves, very clearly and 
very strikingly. The welfare workers who had been 
preaching and moralizing to the boys had concerned 
themselves with what they regarded as the cardinal sins : 
profanity, gambling, drunkenness, and sexual immoral- 
ity. But while they harped on these things constantly, 
they secured little interest on the part of the soldiers 
themselves. At last cards were circulated among multi- 
plied thousands of the men and they were asked to desig- 
nate what they regarded as the "five most repulsive sins. 
The answers were illuminating. Neither drunkenness, 
nor gambling, nor profanity, nor vice figured in the re- 
plies. Heading the list was cowardice. Then came sel- 
fishness. And the other three in order were hypocrisy, 
disloyalty, and meanness. It will be noted that these are 
all sins of the spirit, and when these "old rooks," as we 
used to call them, nailed these as the worst of all sins, 
they displayed a greater profundity, a better grasp on 
the fundamentals of the moral life, than any of the pro- 
fessional moralists who had presumed to lecture them. 

Are the soldiers religious ? No one can hope to evade 
the question. The answer is in the affirmative if by re- 
ligion we mean a pure spirituality based on a recogni- 



130 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

tion of the character of God. The answer is in the 
negative if we make it embrace any form of ecclesias- 
ticism, dogmatism, or credal orthodoxy. In the former 
elements the men are firmly grounded. There is never 
one who does not recognize God, Christ, human need. 
They all carry Bibles, most of them pray, they are al- 
ways ready to attend a religious service or talk about 
religion sincerely and without the slightest trace of em- 
barrassment. But they care very little about the Church, 
less about the forms of religion, and still less about doc- 
trines of all kinds. It is not that they antagonize these 
things; if they were asked about them they would 
doubtless reply that in their opinion they were all right ; 
but they simply have no interest in them. In their 
mind the Church and creeds obscure rather than enhance 
the real values of faith, and it is not possible to work up 
in their souls any enthusiasm for anything that smacks 
of ecclesiasticism. As surely as the world stands, these 
men will absolutely ignore the Church on their return 
unless the Church has the courage and consecration to 
do away with ecclesiasticism, out-grown notions of ortho- 
doxy, and the hollow statements of doctrine which have 
not had any content in a hundred years. Personally, I 
am not inclined to think that the Church will do this. 
But the choice is hers to make, and she may do what 
she chooses. 

But the soldier has a vital religious consciousness 
which embraces all the fundamental ideas of the faith. 
I remember a gathering of men one evening in an old 
stable in a town where we were billeted; we had been 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 131 

smoking, telling stories, singing snatches of popular 
songs, and enjoying ourselves generally. Suddenly a 
sergeant entered and informed the men that the bat- 
talion would move forward into the lines that night. 
There was a slight pause in the conversation; some of 
the men rose to leave and others expressed gratification 
at the news. Then one of the soldiers who had been 
fumbling a song book, and who was not known to be 
religious at all, called out: "Let's sing this song!" It 
was an old hymn beginning : 

Lead on, King Eternal, the day of march has come; 
Henceforth in fields of conquest thy tents shall be our hoine. 
Through days of preparation thy grace has made us strong, 
And now, King Eternal, we lift our battle song. 

The men sang this song with a vim, the very ring of 
their voices attesting their sincerity and their apprecia- 
tion of the sentiment. 

On another occasion I was walking through the 
streets of Lironville in company with a. rather rough 
sergeant, dodging here and there behind the ruined walls 
to avoid being seen by the enemy, whose lines were a 
few rods away. We passed the ruins of the once beau- 
tiful church, terribly wrecked now, and on glancing up 
we observed that the cross on the tower was still intact. 
The sergeant gazed about at the devastation by which 
we were surrounded, fixed his gaze again on the cross, 
lifted his hat, and quoted : 

In the Cross of Christ I glory, 
Towering o'er the wrecks of time. 



132 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

When I first joined my division it was in training far 
behind the lines, and I carefully observed the religious 
sentiments among the men. Here they were rowdy, 
boisterous, seemingly careless, yet there was always a 
strain of deep seriousness present, which manifested it- 
self on all occasions when religious meetings were held. 
These services were invariably crowded. Once I an- 
nounced a Bible Class for Sunday morning and asked 
the men to designate a subject for our discussion. With 
practical unanimity they selected the commandment, 
"Thou shalt not kill," and in the discussion I was sur- 
prised at the depth of understanding with which they 
regarded their present occupation in relation to the 
principles of our religion. 

Within a week the division moved, for the first time, 
to the battle front. When the* order came the men 
gathered again. A change was easily noticeable. They 
were just as rowdy as before, all were glad of the pros- 
pect before them, and none signified any desire to be- 
come religious simply because they might be killed. But 
the latent spiritual impulses of their natures came more 
to the surface, and nearly all of them took advantage of 
the opportunity to express their faith, to get a new 
grasp on their religion, and to renew their allegiance to 
the spiritual realities of the universe. 

Week after week I have gone in and out of the lines, 
to the farthest outposts, through the trenches, in the 
support lines, and among the artillery positions in the 
rear of the lines. It was almost impossible to give 
away New Testaments because all of the men carried 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 133 

them in their pockets already. In any position, trench, 
dug-out, or emplacement, it was only necessary to an- 
nounce that we would have a little religious service to 
get a crowd ; all of the men who could leave their places 
would gather at once. And in those unusual spots, 
while the guns of the enemy roared about us and shrap- 
nel pieces from the shells of the anti-aircraft batteries 
sprinkled us liberally, these men, armed to the teeth, 
wearing gas masks and steel helmets, and engaged in the 
awful business of death, entered into the spirit of re- 
ligious observances with a quiet zeal and fervor which 
evidenced that beneath the rough exterior their hearts 
were fully alive to eternal verities. 

But they are conscious, as all of us are, of the contra- 
diction between their present business and the principles 
of the faith which they profess. If they were theo- 
logians, if they cared one whit for systematic doctrines, 
they would be confused and bewildered, even as the 
Church is now floundering in confusion. It is a good 
thing for them and for religion that they are not theo- 
logians. They simply know that their country has called 
them to do battle, and they are sure that God will be 
with them — that is all they know or care. They have 
no idea that a special providence will hedge them about 
— which is another good thing : they thus have no embar- 
rassing questions to answer, or try to answer. One day 
a visiting minister wanted to preach and I took him to 
a gun emplacement in the support lines. With about 
twenty men gathered around him he was discoursing 
with great unction of soul upon his belief that this war 



134 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

was the cause of God. Suddenly the enemy got our 
range and a few 105s fell alarmingly near. We 
tumbled down into the old dug-out with unseeming alac- 
rity, and as he disappeared into the ground one of the 
soldiers remarked, "This may be the work of the Lord, 
but I'll be damned if I believe it." 

On a certain occasion I was asked to prepare an ar- 
ticle on "The Soldier's Confessional.' 7 I gave thought 
to the subject, and even started the article; but I was 
forced to abandon the effort because I discovered that 
the soldier had no confessional. His religious ideas are 
not systematic enough to be formulated into a confes- 
sional. He cannot even use the Apostle's Creed, unless 
indeed he uses it in the manner after which it is em- 
ployed by the average Christian in the Church and re- 
peats it with his lips without any real understanding of 
its contents or deep conviction of its truthfulness. If 
the soldier carefully analyzed his thoughts about the 
creed he would no doubt be compelled to repeat it some- 
what after this fashion : 

" T believe in God, the Father Almighty ;' He may be 
the creator of heaven and earth, but I know nothing 
about the scientific facts in the case. 'And in Jesus 
Christ, His only Son our Lord;' as for the physical 
facts of His life I do not doubt them especially, but 
there are questions, and I do not consider these things 
material. 'He was crucified, dead, and buried; the 
third day He rose again from the dead, He ascended 
into heaven, and sitteth at the right hand of God the 
Father Almighty ;' I doubt if He shall come again, and 



THE RELIGIOUS SITUATION 135 

I am quite sure that He is not acting in the role of judge 
of the quick and the dead. I believe in a spiritual pres- 
ence in the world and have no objection to calling it the 
Holy Ghost. I think the holy catholic Church is a good 
thing. If 'communion of the saints' means the fel- 
lowship and fraternity of Christian people, then I am 
for it. And I am strong for the forgiveness of sins, the 
immortality of the soul — I do not believe in the resur- 
rection of the physical body — and the life everlasting." 

The soldier's faith is strong but simple. He believes 
in God and Christ, without definition; in man's need 
of God and forgiveness; in the eternal goodness of 
Deity ; in the supremacy of spiritual and moral values ; 
in the resurrection and eternal life. And that is about 
all. Some of us believe it is quite enough. 

So when the soldier returns he will be open to the 
religious appeal, but it must be sincere and unmixed 
with propaganda for the perpetuation of institutions. 
Ecclesiastical rivalries, jealousies, and divisions will be 
despised by this man who has learned so much about 
fraternity and the necessity for solidarity and union. 
When a preacher tells him again that "simple faith in 
Christ is all that is required for salvation," he will be 
quick to ask in return, "Then why do you have so many 
denominations, representing so much pure waste, all 
founded on things which every preacher on earth con- 
fesses to be side issues and non-essentials." And we will 
be interested in knowing what reply the dogmatist will 
make. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE CLERGY AND THE PEOPLE 

It is hardly possible to live anywhere in Europe, or 
in America either, for that matter, and pay even a 
casual attention to religious ideas without discovering 
that there is a tremendous ferment going on in the do- 
main of spiritual faith. There is a realization in nearly 
all quarters that the times are calling for a life of the 
spirit, and the demand for an adequate interpretation 
of God is insistent. But with this there is coupled a 
frank recognition of the fact that no human institutions 
or conceptions are meeting the needs thus felt. And 
accordingly there is a protest against the Church and 
the clergy because of their failure to supply to the 
world the elements which its heart craves in these times ; 
they were naturally expected to conserve and sustain the 
spirits of men in the war the same as other agencies 
were supposed to supply guns, clothes, recreation, 
amusement, cigarettes, and the like. Now the other 
agencies fulfilled their functions admirably, but the 
Church did not. She let people grope in the dark and 
failed to interpret God and the facts of religion in ade- 
quate terms for purposes of these severe days. The 
Church tried to perpetuate her platitudinous utterances 

136 



THE CLERGY AND THE PEOPLE 137 

and doctrines, and since the world had lost interest in 
these things in peaceful times it could hardly be ex- 
pected to flock back to them when war spread its blight 
and brought the demand for a closer touch with reality. 
Hence the protest, which ranges all the way from mild 
indifference to bitter antagonism. 

This about sums up the religious situation as I found 
it in England, France, and Italy after much investiga- 
tion. After reaching Europe my first concern was to 
discover what the Church was doing; my natural in- 
stincts thus prompted and my knowledge that the spirit 
of the people depended largely upon the Church made 
me doubly anxious to secure adequate information. If 
I was making social investigation and was interested in 
the life of the people, of course the Church must not be 
neglected; and the conversation that one could hear any- 
where in regard to religion and its institutionalized life 
convinced me that there was a marked situation to deal 
with. It was therefore with much zest and expectancy 
that I set about the task of securing an understanding of 
these matters. The method of approach was through the 
people, and from that standpoint all conclusions were 
made. I have since had these conclusions severely criti- 
cized, particularly by the clergy, and the strictures were 
always based on the fact that my statements were not in 
total agreement with the views of certain ministers ; the 
critics did not understand, or else they did not approve, 
the fact that my observations were made through the 
people and embodied the views of the people — of all 
ranks and classes, the rich and poor, the soldiers and 



138 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

government officials, rationalists and clergymen, Catho- 
lics and Protestants. One trouble with the clergymen 
to-day is that they approach all matters from their own 
standpoint and regard all social movements through 
their own spectacles. I tried to adopt a different meth- 
od, and my statements have embodied the attitude of the 
people whether they meet with the approval of the 
clergy or not. 

What are the religious ideas in the hearts of the peo- 
ple in these times ? This was one phase of the situa- 
tion, which I started to investigate. After the formation 
of some acquaintances, especially in the case of some 
religious workers in the slum districts and some persons 
who had access to Christian homes of a more elevated 
social station, it was an easy matter to form judgments. 
For several days I did little save visit homes, going the 
pastoral rounds with the social workers, attending little 
home receptions with the soldiers, and in all possible 
ways endeavoring to obtain access to the people. Prac- 
tically all of the homes had suffered from the war — 
sons, husbands, fathers, brothers were dead, mutilated, 
or "out there" — and the utterances that fell from the 
lips of these people at home were representative of the 
deepest sentiments of the heart. 

Without detailing the record of visits and conversa- 
tions with these persons, I may say that the war has 
had upon religious people two opposite effects. In the 
case of one section, the old and more intensely religious 
element of the population, it has served to drive them 
deeper into their faith and make them cling to their 



THE CLERGY AND THE PEOPLE 139 

conceptions and practices with a more passionate devo- 
tion. Suffering of the most intense character, the loss of 
all that they had deemed dear in life, and a dreadful 
uncertainty concerning the outcome of it all — these 
things have driven the people to have recourse to the 
only source of hope and comfort which they have ever 
known, their religion. And so all over Europe one may 
find people to whom religion means more and gives more 
at this time than ever before. I visited in the home of 
a lady prominent in the affairs of a certain Church; 
she and her daughters were in deep mourning, and the 
features of their white faces told stories of mental an- 
guish unspeakable. The two sons and brothers, three 
nephews and cousins, a multitude of friends and loved 
ones were all sleeping beneath the little white crosses 
"out there." To these people the war had no more 
horrors; it had done its worst to them. They were re- 
markably quiet and smiled with a wonderful sweet- 
ness — it made me better to see them smile ! Their con- 
versation was filled with assurances of comfort and 
faith and their hearts were as calm as a summer's after- 
noon. They were sad, but no hatred rankled in their 
souls; they never once spoke of "the 'un." "Perhaps 
the war is a good thing after all," the lovely lady said 
to me; "at any rate it has brought me a faith that I 
never knew before. I have something to pray for now ; 
I know what Christ suffered, I know how valuable the 
doctrine of immortality is, and my faith in a heaven 
is strengthened into a certainty and conviction that 
nothing can shake. When the war came I was driven 



140 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

to my knees and to the Church. When the blows began 
to fall upon my heart I was driven more and more deep- 
ly into communion with God. And now I understand 
how little avails the things that we can handle and lay 
up. Nothing counts but love, and love cannot be sus- 
tained apart from God." And then she smiled her 
wonderful smile and was content. 

There are not many like this lady, but I found sev- 
eral who had known her experience. Down in the slums 
of the east end of London and in other walks they are 
living on the Bread of Life. Each day they go to their 
Churches and return with a new comfort. The fleeting 
glance that I received of this side of religious life made 
me understand that here were the germs of a tremendous 
awakening. But alas! the other side was so apparent 
that it was evident the trend of things was in the other 
direction. 

The war has had an opposite effect upon the lives of 
another section of the people. It has brought to them 
nothing save distress, confusion, doubt. These are the 
more intellectual folk — it is not that the other section do 
not possess intellectual strength, but they do not ap- 
proach the facts of life through that channel. This 
second sectioa is more inclined to weigh facts, evidence, 
and influences. And to them the war has meant mis- 
understandings that have beclouded their faith and filled 
their hearts with uncertainty. In the first place, they 
have heard the charge that Christianity has broken down 
and proved a failure. Over and over the rationalist 
press presents the well-worn arguments. Christianity 



THE CLERGY AND THE PEOPLE 141 

failed to prevent war ! The world has repudiated the 
doctrines of Christ ! Now what about your doctrine of 
the other cheek! And people have been deluded and 
deceived by these specious utterances until some of the 
best of them are half-inclined to throw over religion alto- 
gether. With socialists, labor union enthusiasts, skep- 
tics, New Thought advocates, and the whole coterie of 
agitators inveighing against religion from morning until 
night, and with the Christian apologists either ignor- 
ing the attacks or replying in bulky and expensive tomes 
couched in the phrases of the university lecture room, 
and which the people never see and would not read if 
they did see, it is small wonder that those average men 
who think seriously but superficially have been all but 
swept from their moorings. 

Then adding to this confusion are a group of ex- 
tremely orthodox ecclesiastics with a set of outgrown no- 
tions concerning verbal inspiration and literal interpre- 
tation of the Bible, which issue in a doctrine called pre- 
millenarianism. As Principal Eorsyth remarked, not 
one of these men ever did the New Testament the honor 
of becoming a recognized authority in it, but they are 
vociferous enough to make up for their lack of influ- 
ence and intelligence. Their teachings are that the 
Bible is verbally inspired by God and is infallible, that 
it must be interpreted literally, that prophecy was the 
prediction by inspired men of events that would happen 
in the distant future, and that Christ will soon come 
to establish Himself in person in this world, rule on a 
temporal throne, put his enemies to death, catch up the 



142 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

faithful and make them float in the air, etc., etc. 
They believe that Christ will not come until the world 
goes so completely to hell that it cannot longer get along 
without Him, and in the war they see signs of the com- 
ing. They do not know, or else they do not regard the 
fact, that there has never been an age in which these 
notions did not flourish, there was never a calamity 
which did not breed a perfect swarm of their adherents. 
I visited a preacher who is more or less noted for 
expounding such views. He told me that the world had 
forsaken "the word" and thus the war came about; 
"the word," as understood by him, meant verbal inspira- 
tion and literal interpretation. With his permission I 
propounded a series of questions to which I requested 
answers from his standpoint, some of them being the 
following: On the basis of verbal inspiration how do 
you deal with differing and contradictory accounts of 
the same happening, like the conversion of Paul, for ex- 
ample, without impeaching God by throwing onto Him, 
as inspirer, the responsibility of contradicting Him- 
self? If the Bible is accepted literally in all sections 
what shall we do with the statement in Ecclesiastes that 
"a man hath no preeminence above a beast," and the 
implication in the question "Are ye not much more than 
they ?" If the world must go to hell does not that imply 
the failure of Christ's attempt to redeem the world 
through the operation of His Spirit ? If this hellward 
process is a part of God's plan for the final establishment 
of His kingdom, prepared and outlined centuries ago, 
is not God impeached as the author of a program of 



THE CLERGY AND THE PEOPLE 143 

immorality? If you are anxious to secure the return 
of Christ, and if He will not return until the hellward 
process is complete, would it not be logical for you and 
your crowd to assist the hellward trend by becoming out- 
breaking criminals in society? If you insist on being 
pure and saving yourself, are you not selfish in that you 
postpone the coming of the kingdom in order to secure 
your own salvation ? As was to be expected, this preach- 
er refused to discuss such matters and accused me of 
being an infidel in the employ of the Eationalist Press 
Association ! By forcibly injecting these views into the 
religious situation to-day these pre-millenarians have 
contributed much to spread dissension, confusion, and 
doubt among the people. They play into the hands of 
the rationalist, because, as the people have learned, 
literalism and verbal inspiration cannot be defended in 
the face of the plain fact of the Bible itself; and the 
people who are constantly being taught these indefen- 
sible theories are becoming more and more confused. 

One day a group of correspondents were en route to 
the British Headquarters under the escort of some offi- 
cers detailed for the service by the war department. The 
topics of conversation were naturally varied, but I was 
surprised to note that the subject of religion was 
broached over and over again, and each time the officers 
were willing and prepared to discuss it. The remarks 
relative to spirituality and religion were always most 
respectful and reverent, but they were exceedingly 
flippant and disrespectful in regard to the Church and 
the clergy. "The Archbishop of Canterbury is a Vic- 



144 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

torian relic," was a remark that caused laughter and 
agreement. One intelligent young captain seemed to be 
the spokesman for the entire company, and I ventured 
to put to him certain questions and suggestions in the 
hope that his answers and the attitude of the others to 
them might furnish me some information of value. 

"What has the Church done in the present war in the 
way of service to the people and the nation?" I asked 
him. 

"Nothing whatever," he replied. "She has only made 
trouble. The Church was expected to render no service 
save a spiritual service ; this she has not even attempted, 
and in deserting this legitimate field and trying to work 
in others she has made a jolly mess of it." 

"What has she done in particular, in creating this 
mess ?" 

"Much in every way. There is not an officer in the 
army who does not know that the Church has interfered 
with discipline and contributed to inefficiency by object- 
ing to cricket and other games on Sunday. We use these 
games in training the men : for example a good bowler 
is an excellent bomber because the method of throwing 
is the same, and in the same way fencing develops effi- 
ciency in bayonet fighting. It was our custom to encour- 
age these games on Sunday afternoons, thereby assisting 
our men, entertaining them, and keeping in touch with 
them. Then came the clergy to object, and wherever 
they have sustained their protests demoralization has re- 
sulted. Our men are bored and we lose track of them 



THE CLERGY AND THE PEOPLE 145 

on Sunday. It is a damned outrage, perpetrated by 
damned fools !" 

This conclusion I found to be concurred in by prac- 
tically all the officers, the noted General, an old Sudan 
veteran who had charge of all the training activities, be- 
ing especially indignant at the suggestion that his games 
might be prevented. And when we were being shown 
the cricket field the question, "Have the bishops inter- 
fered with you yet V 9 brought a sullen scowl to the offi- 
cer's face. 

"Have they done anything else V 9 1 asked. 

"Much," my officer replied. "They have made such 
a howl against reprisals that we must sit quietly and be 
bombed day after day by the Hun without being able to 
lift a finger in retaliation. The clergy alone are re- 
sponsible for the situation, as everybody knows. They 
plead the efficacy of moral suasion and example in deal- 
ing with an enemy whose conceptions of such things are 
long since dead. The army demands reprisals, and the 
same demand is echoed by the king and tke people. But 
the clergy prevent the policy. Bah ! To hell with such 
a government l" 

"Do not the clergy render good service as chaplains ?" 

"Some do, most do not. Too many times they hinder 
by their jealousy of the Y. M. C. A. and of other chap- 
lains sent out by different communions. We could dis- 
pense with most of them and be better off." 

"What do you think is wrong with them V 9 

"I think the trouble is plain ignorance. They know 
nothing about the people. They have been trained in 



146 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

another direction and have lived apart from them, so 
that to-day they have no message for the nation. I went 
home from the trenches on Easter and went to hear my 
own parson. He preached from the text, 'I go a-fishing,' 
and I sat there hungry for some message of hope and 
some sign of God ; but the padre had no idea of what I 
needed or what the people needed. They should compel 
all young clergymen to spend a few years in the east 
end as a part of their education." 

"What do the soldiers think of the clergymen at the 
front?" 

"They have different ideas for different parsons. But 
as a rule they do not take the chaplains seriously. He 
is either what you call 'a good fellow' and drinks with 
the men, else he lives apart from them; in either case 
his spiritual influence is small. The men understand 
that a drinking parson, and one who excuses their im- 
morality, as most of them do after some fashion, does 
not represent Christ." 

"You seem to see little good in the clergymen," I at 
last said to him. 

"Little good at the present time," he agreed. "The 
Church has caused trouble in every land. In Ireland, 
England, Mexico, Eussia, Italy, Canada, and Australia 
the Church has been the source of mischief and dissen- 
sion. The only exception is in France, where the gov- 
ernment paid not the least attention to the clergy but 
conscripted them as common soldiers along with the run 
of men. The result has been that the French priests 
are more beloved than ever before." 



THE CLERGY AND THE PEOPLE 147 

"But you must remember that in all of these coun- 
tries you mention the trouble has been caused by a 
Church which either has or claims temporal and politi- 
cal rights." 

"Ah! You have sensed the trouble/' he exclaimed. 
"It is a political Church that bothers us. Even here in 
England the non-conformists have kept their souls. 
Their young men have 'joined up' willingly, their mes- 
sage has been true, and they should be excepted from 
any of the strictures which I have pronounced against 
these Anglicans. After this war we will have a settle- 
ment, and one of the first acts of reconstruction must be 
the disestablishment of the Church." 

The doctrines set forth by this young captain I later 
found to be the prevailing sentiments everywhere — 
among the soldiers, officials, and men on the street. And 
they are held and freely promulgated by men who are 
themselves deeply religious and communicants of the 
established Church; in practically all instances these 
persons took care to conclude their prophecies on what 
would happen to the Church after the war with the state- 
ment, "But we must see to it that religion does not suf- 
fer." 

The situation created in me a new desire to see for 
myself these clergymen who were thus abused. Armed 
with letters of commendation and introduction from 
some of the leading clergymen of America, the posses- 
sion of which, reenf orcing my own position, seemed cal- 
culated to secure for me the attention of any minister 
anywhere, I began the rounds. My first visit was to a 



148 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

Methodist known on both sides of the Atlantic, a dis- 
tinguished editor, author, and preacher. He received 
me with a pale smile and showed a mild interest when 
he read my credentials and heard my mission. But I 
could get nothing from him of interest, and my hopes 
that he would assist me faded. He showed no inclina- 
tion to extend facilities that would expedite my work, 
and as for the fact that the Church had any especial 
mission in the present crisis, or was the object of any 
special opposition on the part of persons who mattered, 
he seemed never to have heard of it. Across the street 
I would find the old Bunhill Fields burying grounds 
and the graves of Susannah Wesley, John Bunyan, 
DeEoe, and other celebrities, while the City Road 
Chapel, Wesley's House, and Museum were close at 
hand ; I would be interested in these things ! And in- 
deed I did get more inspiration from these remains of 
the dead than I received from the living in that vicinity. 
I tried it again. Mine host this time was another 
noted divine, author of books on sale but seldom read 
in this country, whose mighty Church lifts its dome 
across from Westminster Abbey. I searched for thirty 
minutes before I could discover where this pastor kept 
himself, and at last I found myself in his presence. 
He said he was glad to see me, but he did not act like it. 
He put himself out but little in receiving me ; in fact he 
entirely dispensed with the formality of asking me to 
have a chair and talk with him. One swift glance over 
his spectacles was the only look I received from him, 
and as he bustled around he observed, "If you are pres- 



THE CLERGY AND THE PEOPLE 149 

ent at any of our services I shall be pleased to have a 
word with you." 

I thought I would perhaps succeed better elsewhere, 
and I motored across Westminster Bridge to a clergy- 
man known around the world. Here I was received 
kindly but coldly. I could not draw this pastor out on 
any subject, and my suggestion that the war presented 
a challenge to the religious world simply evoked the re- 
ply: "Certainly, sir, certainly. We must hold the 
faith. I see in it all the fulfillment of prophecy. We 
must be nearing the end ; yes, we must be, indeed !" By 
this time I had begun to think that discourtesy was a 
part of the general equipment of British clergymen. It 
was not until later that I realized the possible cause of 
the attitude I encountered; a Scotchman told me — I 
was wearing a straw hat and a brown suit with a belt 
around the waist ! Offense enough ! 

I met the one representative of an efficient ministry 
in a live young minister down Whitechapel way; he 
was in charge of a system of missions in the east end of 
London and was living, moving, and having his being 
with the people. He knew them and their problems, 
and his* establishment radiated helpfulness* He smoked 
but did not drink, and lived the life of a man among 
men. I found him open to the appeal of the national 
crisis and crying out his heart for a method to assist, 
and daily he was giving his strong right arm to the 
service of the distressed. It was no wonder that his 
auditorium, down in the slums, was an immense one 



150 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

and that the Queen and the Princess Mary were wont 
to pay him a visit once in a while. 

I came from the atmosphere of America, and was 
almost amazed at the lethargy which possessed the clergy 
of England. I found it a literal truth that those whom 
I visited "knew little about life and little about the de- 
mands made upon them by the present age. There were 
brilliant exceptions, of course, but as a general rule it 
seemed to me true that "their training had stereotyped 
their minds." I attended their services and heard them 
preach — good, wholesome sermons for the most part and 
from a theoretical standpoint. But I met no clergymen 
who could tell me what should be done about the de- 
plorable state of European social morality, and none 
offered a program of social endeavor. Surely if ever a 
Church deserved disestablishment it is the Church of 
England, and one hopes that the prediction of the young 
captain may come true. 

I should be dealing unjustly, however, if I left the 
impression that there are no clergymen who are grasp- 
ing the significance of these days. I have seen scores 
of them. They labor in the trenches and on the firing 
lines, in the hospitals and prison camps, everywhere men 
are found. !No sacrifice is too great for them to make. 
These are they who have a firm grasp on the spiritual 
realities of the universe and are able to interpret them 
in terms of life. They do not, like so many of their 
fellows, cover the sins of the Tommies with admiring 
phrases and balance their courage and unselfishness over 
against their immorality and drunkenness so as to give 



THE CLERGY AND THE PEOPLE 151 

them a clean slate. Neither do thej dabble in pre- 
millenarian foolishness or any other form of physical 
interpretation. And they are not confused in their 
thinking concerning God. To such as these Mr. Wells 
makes no appeal, because they know what Mr. Wells 
does not; while he was reveling in socialistic fantas- 
tics they were sitting at the feet of the Master of all 
the ages; their wisdom is the fruit of long experience 
while his is the result of presumptuous conceit, touched 
with a sense of former failure. Unto such men as these 
all honor should be accorded — and it will be. 

And the soldiers are religious too, in a sense, al- 
though they do not seem to be Christians. They know 
"the White Comrade" but they do not connect Him with 
the Church — rather do they connect the Church with 
the Pharisees whom He denounced so severely. It is a 
natural religion that they have — the kind that the Stu- 
dent in Arms described in those wonderful words which 
have been so often quoted that they do not need quota- 
tion any more. Perhaps when this war is over the clergy 
will have learned a lesson. Perhaps the Church will 
reform enough to learn where the people are and 
what the Bible is. And then this natural religion 
which the soldiers have can be made to issue into the 
Christianity of a repentant Church, and the "White 
Comrade" will cover the earth with His spiritual influ- 
ence. It is a consummation devoutly to be wished. 



CHAPTER VII 



THE CHURCH AND THE WAR 



There are perhaps few well-informed people to-day 
who do not realize that the outlook for the Church, aside 
from our faith in its ultimate triumph and on the basis 
of the facts as they now present themselves, is far from 
bright. There is a protest against it in all parts of the 
world, ranging in its degree of severity from mild in- 
difference to violent hatred, and this opposition from 
the outside is reenforced by unrest on the inside. And 
so marked is the tendency against the Church that we 
might abandon all hope and join the ranks of those who 
so confidently predict its early and complete destruc- 
tion did we not understand the social and personal need 
of religious organizations, and did we not have a spiri- 
tual faith in the premises. 

In France the antagonism to the Church is perhaps 
not so marked as elsewhere, for there prevails at the 
present time a more cordial feeling towards it than has 
been the case in recent years. The trammels of Roman 
Catholicism were recently broken, and as a result of 
this action there grew up an estrangement between 
France and the Vatican that amounted almost to open 
hostility. This feeling still exists in a great degree, the 

152 



THE CHURCH AND THE WAR 153 

Pope still maintaining a sullen attitude toward France 
and France having a deep suspicion of the Pope. Un- 
like some of her allies, she has not sent a diplomatic 
representative to the papal court, and she was the last 
nation to officially thank his holiness for his efforts in 
securing the transfer and exchange of prisoners of war. 
But while the relations are by no means cordial, there 
are signs that France regards the Church in a light 
somewhat more favorable than formerly. This is due 
almost wholly to the fact that the priests are fighting 
in the trenches as private soldiers. By conscripting the 
ecclesiastics along with all others France avoided the 
trouble which England has incurred and kept down 
some of the causes of the anti-ecclesiasticism which pre- 
vails across the channel. At the same time certain of the 
priests have demeaned themselves nobly in the war and 
have gained the respect of the people. Thus France has 
forgotten that the priests are conscripts, that they doubt- 
less would not have "joined up" otherwise, and that they 
have caused dissension and trouble in all of the allied 
countries where they were exempted. The worst thing 
that could have happened to the Church was clerical 
exemption from military service; this lies at the base 
of much opposition and misunderstanding and has 
served to draw the Church farther away from the peo- 
ple. But although the attitude of the French toward 
the Church has somewhat improved, there are no signs 
that cordial relations are about to be entered into, nor 
are the people flocking to the churches as a result of the 
war. The indifference and opposition which prevails 



154 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

elsewhere in the world is prominent in France also. 

In Italy the anti-ecclesiastical spirit is marked. Here 
the Church has suffered much from the war. Rome is 
convinced, along with the rest of Europe, that the Pope 
is at heart pro-German, and the action of the Vatican 
in retaining enemy aliens in official positions, and the 
Gerlac case in particular, has embittered the people. 
The Pope protested because the diplomatic representa- 
tives of Germany and Austria left Rome at the outbreak 
of the war, and he has been unwilling to submit to the 
delays and inconveniences in the transmission of mail 
and telegraphic communications which the state of bel- 
ligerency made incumbent upon all people. Then his 
peace proposals have all had a pro-German ring. It 
would be difficult to convince the Italian masses that 
Benedict is not at heart in sympathy with the cause of 
the Central allies. The Vatican itself, however, does 
not understand that it has estranged the people more 
and more during the war. Because of the fact that Eng- 
land and Russia have sent representatives to its court 
since the war began it believes the hand of the Pope has 
been strengthened, and that these nations are coming to 
a recognition of his temporal claims. Nothing could 
be farther from the truth. These agents are little more 
than secret, service operatives, and their appointment 
was made with no other motive than to have men on the 
ground to watch the operations inside the Vatican pal- 
ace. They represent suspicion rather than cordiality. 

This attitude which is the outgrowth of the war comes 
on top of an anti-papal sentiment which has been grow- 



THE CHURCH AND THE WAR 155 

ing in Italy since the adoption of the absurd "prisoner 
of the Vatican" theory, and even before that time. This 
fiction, and the temporal phases of the Italian question 
upon which it rests, are derided and sneered at by the 
people in all the ranks of society, and the longer these 
political aspirations are cherished the deeper will be- 
come the gulf between the Church and the people. Rome 
is by far the most anti-papal city of Europe, and the 
lack of respect for the Church is surprising to the casual 
observer. The most strenuous opposition to the hier- 
archy of the Church runs through Italian society, and 
it comes from ministers of state, captains of industry, 
leaders in thought, the men on the street, socialists, and 
all other social groups. The clerical party, defenders 
of the Church, embraces an insignificant portion of the 
people who are Catholics; these people are determined 
to stand by and support the Law of Guarantees no mat- 
ter what may happen to the Church. 

The same state of affairs prevails in England also. 
So far as the Catholic Church is concerned the oppo- 
sition has deepened into hatred. In Ireland the Catho- 
lics have hobnobbed with the enemy and have attempted 
to betray the Empire while it was struggling for its life, 
just as they have done in every war in which Britain 
has been engaged. In Canada they have opposed con- 
scription, prevented enlistment, and hampered the con- 
duct of the war in many ways, and they have done the 
same thing in Australia. England, therefore, has a 
settled conviction that the Catholics are traitors, and she 
hates the Church accordingly. 



156 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

And England lias come almost to blows with the An- 
glicans also. Time and again I have heard the officers 
of the British army condemn the Church with deep bit- 
terness, and in nearly all cases these officers were com- 
municants of the Church and possessed of deep religious 
sentiments. In one group I heard an officer express the 
consensus'of opinion by saying that in Russia, England, 
Prance, Italy, Germany, Canada, Australia, Ireland, 
and Mexico the Church had given trouble in the war, 
and he expressed the sentiment that the entire idea 
should be thrown overboard, or some new organization 
be built up on the facts of religion. The governmental 
officials, the officers, the soldiers, and the people gener- 
ally feel that the Church has not "played the game," 
and that the war has broken down her organization com- 
pletely. 

The Countess of Warwick states the case against the 
Church this way: "Granted that the task before the 
Church was a very formidable one, that it was even im- 
possible, something of the equivalent in moral courage 
to the physical courage shown upon the battle field 
should have been forthcoming from its spokesmen. Un- 
fortunately there is much to suggest that the Estab- 
lished Church is conserving its courage for the post hel- 
ium task of preaching the old platitudes and asking 
those who have seen war, or merely suffered by it, to 
take them seriously. And truly courage of a kind is 
needed for this. . . . The failure of the Established 
Church during the war is the inevitable result of its 
failure during the long years that preceded it. It has 



THE CHURCH AND THE WAR 157 

been the collapse of an Institution that deliberately 
dwelt in a world of its own imagining, and never had 
the strength of will or purpose to tell home-truths to 
the comfortable and the possessing classes, upon whose 
support it has learned to rely. . . . Peace has its mas- 
sacres no less complete than war, and to the most of 
these massacres, whether by drink, disease, poverty, or 
vice, the Established Church has been a spectator, if 
the term can be applied to that which has eyes but sees 
not, ears but hears not, and a mouth in which most ut- 
terance is platitudinous. The Heads of the Estab- 
lished Church, with one or two brilliant exceptions, do 
not know anything of the actualities of the world in 
which they live ; they do not dare to know ; their train- 
ing has stereotyped their minds; the present state of 
the world has found them not only unprepared, but quite 
helpless to cope with it. I do not expect to live to see 
the Established Church recognize the truth that the real 
salvation of this country depends upon the removal of 
all social conditions that create paupers, criminals, and 
lunatics. I do not expect to hear ministers advocating 
ceaselessly in the pulpit the taking of the necessary 
measures for restoring the social balance, quite regard- 
less of the chance that there may be among the congre- 
gation some of those whose life-work is responsible for 
one or more of the evils denounced. Before the war, 
such home-truths were tolerated only from the preachers 
who were extremely fashionable and preached to an 
audience almost exclusively feminine, an audience that 
took no heed of what they said, and was concerned only 



158 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

with the manner of saying it. One does not dare to 
dwell upon the fashionable preacher whose congrega- 
tion is largely feminine !" ("The New Religion," Hib- 
bert Journal. July, 1917.) 

This protest is voiced from the standpoint of the In- 
ternationalist, whose opposition is based on the alleged 
fact that the Church has not performed her social duty. 
This attitude on the part of socialists is by no means 
new, but it has been accentuated and given a new influ- 
ence by the war. This is true because the war has re- 
vealed the need of some social agency which can solve 
the problems of inequality and secure social justice ; and 
these problems have been revealed as moral at the bot- 
tom and hence in the province of the Church. And since 
they have not been solved it is perfectly natural that the 
failure to solve them should be laid at the door of the 
Church. Then the laboring man has gained a new in- 
fluence in the order of things as they exist at the present 
time ; he has more money and he is recognized as being 
a more vital factor in the life of our times. Therefore 
his opinions have more weight, and thus much atten- 
tion is being given to his opinion of the Church. Social- 
ism is also become more formidable in Europe, owing 
to the new position of the laborer, the strength of labor 
unions in the present crisis, and the hopes which the 
Allies placed upon the German socialists in the matter 
of destroying autocracy from the inside and bringing 
about peace. 

The causes for such an attitude towards the Church 
are many and varied. One of them is the general unrest 



THE CHURCH AND THE WAR 159 

and uncertainty in all matters of religion. The war has 
shocked people out of their old complacency in regard 
to spiritual affairs, and in the search for stability they 
have become confused. A thousand voices call them this 
way and that. One cries out that the war proves the 
final failure of Christianity, another says that the end 
of the world is at hand, still another upholds one of 
the multitude of foolish isms that are adrift to-day, and 
one makes a rationalistic attack on the subject matter 
of faith. Gradually people are losing their religion, as 
a systematic and well-grounded conviction. It brings 
them no comfort and hope in the midst of the greatest 
sorrow they have ever known. They hear of move- 
ments and doctrines which they cannot understand, and 
their minds and hearts become beclouded with anxiety 
and doubt. There is religious unrest, change, and flux 
all over the world, and the Church suffers on both sides. 
There can be little doubt that when the religious atmos- 
phere clears the ecclesiastical air will clear also. 

Then the European clergy are clearly out of touch 
with the people. They do not know where the people 
live, what they are doing, what their problems are, or 
how they are getting on. When the Countess of War- 
wick declares that they are living in a world of their 
own imagining, she is right. Their education really 
does separate them from life, and under the European 
form of ecclesiastical administration they have little in- 
centive to plunge into the social tasks and problems of 
the day. It is a common complaint on the part of the 
soldiers that the Church never cared anything about 



160 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

them, hence they never cared anything about the Church. 
The clergymen themselves will readily admit, in many 
cases, at least, that they are divorced from the people. 
In this situation it is inevitable that the Church should 
decline; in this situation the Church ought to decline, 
since it cannot fulfill its function in the world while it 
lives over the heads of the men in the street. The ser- 
mons that one hears in the average Church in which a 
middle aged clergyman officiates will reveal the fact 
that the preacher does not take his start from the facts 
of human existence. On one occasion I heard a chaplain 
who had just come from the front tell of a fellow chap- 
lain who had preached to a company of men just 
emerged from an experience of eight days under fire in 
the front line on the subject, "Does the Holy Spirit pro- 
ceed from the Father or from the Father and the Son f ' 
The Church knows more about heaven than it does about 
the earth, and it knows next to nothing about heaven. 
Its theology, its concerns, the very tones of its ministers 
unfit it to grasp the life of the times. The people know 
this, and they see no good in such an institution. Here 
is the secret of much of the opposition which the Church 
encounters. 

There is the further fact that the divisions in the 
Church serve to repel the people. The average man sees 
no sense in such divisions, since they are based on things 
which do not interest him in the least; when the 
Churches themselves admit that the things upon which 
they differ are details and not fundamentals and at the 
same time set so much store by the details that they re- 



THE CHURCH AND THE WAR 161 

fuse to get together, the average man repudiates them. 
It seems to him that they spend more energy caring 
for their details than in pushing their fundamentals. 
In this he is undoubtedly right. When the war broke 
out everything else united in a common task. Political 
and social differences were forgotten, old animosities 
were laid aside. But the Church refused to unite, and 
to-day her divisions are among her greatest handicaps. 
And by keeping them up she is more and more estrang- 
ing the people. 

The following extract from Sherwood Eddy will 
show the situation in too many cases: "In the last 
hospital we visited, the young American Episcopal 
chaplain working with one of our own units asked the 
writer to accompany him one morning to help him in 
cheering up the patients, giving them Testaments, meet- 
ing their needs, and answering their doubts and diffi- 
culties. While we were proceeding through one of the 
wards, the Nonconformist chaplain came by. The 
writer was speaking to a poor boy who was dying. The 
chaplain seemed shocked and surprised that we were 
speaking to one of his patients without his permission. 
The young Episcopal chaplain explained that he felt 
sure the chaplain would not mind if we tried to help 
the men. Although he followed him out of the ward and 
tried his best to make his peace with him, the chaplain 
reported the matter, and we were prevented from doing 
personal Christian work in neighboring hospitals. The 
Roman Catholic chaplain in the next hospital, a most 
consecrated and earnest man, has managed to get a mili- 



162 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

tary rule passed that no services can be held in any ward 
of the hospital unless every Eoman Catholic patient is 
bodily carried out. This has successfully prevented the 
holding of any Christian services whatsoever, Catholic 
or Protestant. To give another instance — a personal 
friend of the writer, a young Anglican clergyman, a 
widely known college principal, was serving in one of 
the huts of a Convalescent Camp. He had made the 
acquaintance of the patients in some twelve wards and 
was going the rounds every morning telling the war 
news, giving oranges to the fevered, and cheering up 
the depressed. The Commandant came with apologies 
and told him that although he was doing the best Chris- 
tian work in thethospital it must be discontinued, as the 
chaplain objected. Our friend, who was a clergyman of 
the same communion as the chaplain, called upon him 
and asked if he had any objection to the distribution of 
fruit. He replied that if our friend did this it would 
give an unfair advantage to his work as his particular 
organization would get the credit, and that he, as the 
chaplain, must 'push his own show.' To continue in the 
words of our friend : 'Then I asked him if I could send 
the fruit through the lady workers or the hut orderlies, 
or the Tommies who were friends of the wounded. But 
he refused all. So I asked him if he would distribute 
them if I gave them. This he agreed to, and I have 
sent them to him since then. But he is too busy/ The 
oranges were not distributed, and our friend concludes : 
'I am out against the whole principle on which he acts. 
I don't think he is much to be blamed. He is one of the 



THE CHURCH AND THE WAR 163 

best; a keen, hard working, pleasant man, zealous for 
his own show, and in its interests doing much for the 
men. And in his principle of action he is not an ex- 
ception, but a common type of the Anglican padre as I 
have met him in many lands. They are trained and 
encouraged to push their own show. But this keen- 
ness on one's own show rather than on men, is the very 
essence of the sin of schism, and the very root of Phari- 
saism. Now, as a rule, all the sects stand for their own 
show first, and men know it. I am ashamed to be a 
parson to-day. Men were not made for any Church, 
but the Church for them.' " ("With Our Soldiers in 
France," 156-158.) 

The sight of a divided Church, divided in most 
cases over the merest trivialities in comparison to funda- 
mental agreements, entailing the most tremendous waste 
and overlapping of energies, is calculated to repel and 
disgust the average man ; and the matter is made worse 
by the fact that the leaders of the ecclesiastical organi- 
zations alone are responsible for the situation, since 
the denominational divisions have long since lost the 
loyalty of the laity. 

Another cause of the present antagonism to the 
Church is found in the wide spread feeling that the 
Church does not properly represent Christianity. Re- 
ligion is not suffering overmuch, and Christianity, while 
it is the object of attack, is still supreme in the world. 
In this situation the Church could not decline except the 
people believed it to be unrepresentative of Christ. 
Such sentiments appear especially among the soldiers. 



164* SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

They seem to associate all that they deem noble with 
the name of Christ, and "The White Comrade" secures 
their love and worship. They realize His religion means 
love, peace, goodness, salvation — the very negation of 
everything this war means; they are quite sure that if 
Christ had His way this horror would not have hap- 
pened ; and they are longing for the time to come when 
Christ may have His way, for no person hates war so 
cordially as the common soldier. Therefore any move- 
ment that bids fair to let Christ have His way may be 
sure of the support of these men. 

They draw away from or ignore the Church for the 
simple reason that they do not see the Christ influence 
emanating from it. It stands, in their opinion, for a 
smug respectability. It does not seem to insist upon 
morality very much, and upon social justice not at all. 
Its social activity does not reflect its prayers, and to the 
soldier it seems to represent the very Pharisaism which 
Christ so bitterly denounced. If it ever cared much for 
them, common men of the streets, before the war they 
never found it out. And its love for them in the pres- 
ent crisis does not seem to affect them much. It over- 
shoots the mark, and in many cases even verifies the 
suspicion they have always entertained concerning it. 
For its clergymen are coddling them and flattering them 
without making any serious attempts to convert them; 
and they even go so far as to excuse the most immoral 
practices and assure the men that they will be saved if 
they are brave and die as true Britishers. You cannot 
deceive the soldier in any such way; he instinctively 



THE CHURCH AND THE WAR 165 

understands that this is not the way of Christ. On one 
occasion an English chaplain, wholly unknown to me, 
recognized me as an American by the cut of my coat 
and, leaving the company of soldiers with whom he had 
been drinking and smoking, came to me with an offer of 
whiskey and cigarettes. "You will like these," he said, 
"for they are American brands." I declined his kind 
offer and handed him my card with the remark, "I am 
a clergyman and hence do not drink whiskey." He 
seemed not in the least abashed, rather surprised, and 
merely replied, "Oh, well, this is war." But the soldiers 
enjoyed the incident immensely and were rather harsh 
in their ridicule of the chaplain. And later one of them 
said to me, "He had better have your ideas or you had 
better have his cross and collar !" 

It is easy to see that the European Church did very 
little in the war. There was a "Church Army," organ- 
ized in imitation of the Salvation Army, and supposedly 
in opposition to it, but its influence was nil. In social 
endeavor, and even in evangelistic religion, the Y. M. 
C. A. supplanted the Church, and the Church seemed 
perfectly willing to give way, knowing that in her di- 
vided state she was entirely impotent to deal with the 
situation. She sent out her chaplains, but they accom- 
plished little; they were either out of touch with the 
problems of life and could make no appeal to the men, 
else they were "good fellows" with them, socially popu- 
lar but religiously uninspected. At home the Church 
preached the war, prayed for the war, and urged en- 
listment. But while she thought that in this way she 



166 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

was rendering a great service, the public did not con- 
sider this any service at all. Little thanks the Church 
received for her prayers and moral sanctions. No man 
would be excused from military duty, remarks a recent 
writer, on the ground that he devotes so many hours 
per day to praying for the war. These things were taken 
as a matter of course, deserving neither thanks nor 
attention ; they did not count in the balance either way. 
Over against this, however, there were certain things 
which make some people believe that the Church did 
not support the war sincerely. Leading the list was her 
opposition to a policy of reprisals in the matter of air 
raids. The people demanded reprisals, that the Hun 
be repaid in his own coin. They wanted British air- 
ships to sail over German towns and bomb unprotected 
German people, as the Germans themselves had treated 
the British. The king desired this, although it makes 
not the least difference in England what the king de- 
sires. Ministers of state wanted it, so did the army, 
and the same is true of the public generally. But it 
was opposed by the Church, which, under the leader- 
ship of the Archbishop of Canterbury and some leading 
educators, long prevented it. The argument was that 
their country had conducted the war on a high plane and 
should not descend to barbarism for the simple reason 
that the enemy descended to it. There was no military 
advantage to be gained by returning evil for evil, and 
it would even work against military success by forcing 
the withdrawal of airships from the fronts. The posi- 
tion taken by the Church leaders was right, and the 



THE CHURCH AND THE WAR 167 

only one morally defensible ; if it could have been main- 
tained England would have come out of the war morally 
redeemed from the disgrace which some of her past ac- 
tions have brought upon her, and then even those who 
favored reprisals would be proud of her. But hatred 
held sway to such an extent that most of the people were 
even willing to jeopardize success at the front to wreak 
vengeance upon German women and children, whose 
destruction would in nowise help win the war. In 
fact, it might have defeated its purpose by cementing 
the people, as the German outrages did in England. 
There is no doubt that the policy of ruthlessness on 
the part of the Hun was the thing which united England 
and made possible the creation of a mighty army by 
the volunteer system. But the people saw red. "Let 
the gutters run full with the blood of German women 
and children" — this, says the Archbishop of Canterbury, 
was the sentiment expressed in many letters he re- 
ceived. 

Coupled with this was the exemption of the clergy, a 
cause of dissatisfaction that was practically universal. 
Over and over again have I heard complaints based on 
this score. It was not that the young clergymen were 
unwilling to "join up"; they were not permitted by 
their superiors to enlist. Some of them, it is true, 
entered the army regardless, but in so doing they 
doubtless forfeited all hope of preference in their pro- 
fession after the war, and the chances are that they 
will not return to it. The people feel, and rightly so, 
that there was no justice in exempting the young clergy- 



168 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

man, and the fact that lie was exempted drew him apart 
from the common run of men — and he was already too 
far apart from them. And it caused the clergy to be 
regarded as a group of unpatriotic "slackers;" the 
speeches and prayers of a set of men who will not 
serve their country by bearing arms avail little. But 
the most serious aspect of this matter is the fact that 
after the war we are likely to have clergymen who are 
still more out of touch with life, who missed the 
experiences which most of their fellows underwent, and 
who must bear the stigma of missing it for unpatriotic 
reasons. Unless this can be corrected there is little hope 
for the Anglican Church in the future. 

Practically all of this opposition is against the dom- 
inating or established Church in the various countries ; 
in Italy and France the Eoman Catholic and in Eng- 
land the Anglican communions bear the brunt of the 
dissatisfaction. With the Nonconformists the case is 
different, for while they suffer from the general religious 
uncertainty and the disrepute which has overtaken the 
leading ecclesiastical organizations, they do not meet 
such bitter denunciation as falls to the lot of the others. 
I took the liberty of pointing out to a group of officers, 
whose criticism of the Church had been quite sharp, 
the fact that all of the communions which had given 
trouble in any country were either the possessors of or 
claimants for political power, and that the Nonconform- 
ists had deported themselves better. All hands agree 
in this ; even the Countess of Warwick admits that the 
chapel has preserved its soul and its moral courage in 



THE CHURCH AND THE WAR 169 

the present crisis. There is toward it a kindlier feeling 
everywhere. Nonconformist clergymen have "joined 
up" more freely, they have not dabbled in politics or 
endeavored to dictate to the government, and they have 
demeaned themselves more admirably in every way. It 
was easier for them, since they were not looked to for 
any definite program or leadership. They at least are 
in touch with the people; since their income depends 
upon the voluntary contributions of the people they 
have a motive for understanding them that is not alto- 
gether spiritual. If there is any happy outlook for the 
Church in Europe to-day it is in the case of Noncon- 
formity. And if these communions would only be con- 
tent to live their own lives and make their own appeals, 
without the constant imitation of the Anglican ritual 
and practices, it would be easy to predict that they 
would control the society of the future. 

But the general dissatisfaction against the Estab- 
lishment does not signify at all that the Nonconformist 
Churches are gaining from it. Men do not fall out with 
the former and then go to the latter; they rather fall 
out with all and either disregard religion entirely or 
are caught by some of the visionary schemes of "natural 
religion," unattached and unorganized idealism like 
that represented by the Countess of Warwick or Mr. 
Wells, and in the end this means a total loss of religion 
through the loss of expressional channels. 

Neither does the dissatisfaction with the Church in- 
dicate that religion is suffering. Christianity suffers, 
although most of the critics of the Church do not mean 



170 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

it to, but not in proportion with the Church itself. 
Most of the people who criticize the Church so severely 
are themselves communicants of the very Church they 
criticize. In Italy I employed a guide and interpreter, 
a most intelligent and cultured man, possessed of a 
wonderful degree of historical knowledge. This man 
was most outspoken against the Vatican, criticizing it 
unmercifully on the most reasonable grounds. But 
while he thus condemned the Church and its entire 
hierarchy he was a devout Catholic, and when I re- 
quired his services I could always find him on his 
knees in the Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli. The 
feeling is that religion must in some manner be pre- 
served and that an organization is absolutely necessary 
to preserve its vitality. The idea of the Church is safe 
in Europe, for, with the exception of a few vociferous 
persons, the people understand the necessity of some- 
thing that corresponds to it and fulfills its functions. 
But they have done with whatever hierarchy exists. In 
Italy the political pretensions of the Vatican can never 
be realized, in France the disestablishment will be per- 
manent, in England the Anglican establishment is tot- 
tering to its fall. While the world is being made safe 
for democracy, the Church is being made safe for it 
also. Henceforth the people, and not a superior clergy, 
will have charge of their own religious affairs. And 
that will give us a different Church, interpreting re- 
ligion in different terms, and affording different ave- 
nues for its expression into living service. 



CHAPTEE VIII 

RECONSTRUCTION OF RELIGION AFTER THE WAR 

The person who sets himself the task of preparing a 
definite program for the readjustment of the ideas of 
religion and the rejuvenation of its spirit to meet the 
changed conditions which will prevail after the war 
may well he looked upon askance, for the problems are 
such that they can neither be understood nor solved 
until the war has done its worst and run its course. It 
is comparatively easy to dissect and to sift out the ele- 
ments that are being discarded; the religious situation 
upon which any one can look does that for us. But 
to do the constructive work is more difficult ; in fact we 
may say that it is impossible to fully cover the case, 
especially in the matter of developing a detailed pro- 
gram systematically outlined. This is true in all such 
cases, and it has been made the basis of conservative 
protests against making any sort of a diagnosis. On all 
sides and at all times we may hear from the conserva- 
tive camp, especially from the superior clergy and the 
ecclesiastical vested interests, frantic urgings that noth- 
ing be said against the present order of things until 
one has a fully prepared system which can be auto- 
matically slipped in as a substitute. But advancing 

171 



172 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

things do not go that way, and never have. Faults al- 
ways stand revealed before we know the method of cor- 
rection, and the revealing is a prior necessity to the cor- 
rection. Construction must follow destruction in all 
instances, and the diagnostician is just as important 
as the man who effects the crure on the basis of the diag- 
nosis. We shall not, therefore, pay overmuch attention 
to the official conservatives who denounce us for recog- 
nizing the shortcomings of the present order before we 
are fully prepared to reconstruct it and make it per- 
fect. 

Nevertheless, we should be able to point out the gen- 
eral direction in which the process of reconstruction will 
move, and the details of the program will have to be 
discovered and applied when all the facts are before 
us and as the world goes on. Both the development and 
the application of the remedy must be a gradual and 
progressive process. 

There are some, we may be sure, who will believe that 
no reconstruction will be necessary. Certain religious 
persons have always opposed reconstruction of "the faith 
once delivered to the saints," and they have insisted 
on bringing under the category of "the faith" all the 
matters of theology, polity, and administration. As 
they have refused to recognize any signs of progress 
anywhere, it is doubtful if even the war will be suffi- 
cient to shock them out of that attitude. If they had 
their way the Church would die and Christianity would 
be banished from the face of the earth by the natural 
advances of civilization. But we need give no heed to 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION ITS 

such persons. It is as certain as the shining of the sun 
that our religious ideas and processes will have to be 
reorganized and rejuvenated if Christianity is to he 
perpetuated in the society of this world after this war. 

It is not strange that this should he so, for all other 
influences will have to submit to the same process. The 
only thing of which we are sure to-day is that we are 
sure of nothing. Everything that we know is being 
tested in the crucible of the world war, and this in- 
cludes every idea, every institution, and every influence. 
We cannot prophesy that anything will come out of it 
alive ; we can prophesy that nothing will come out of it 
as it went in. This is true of the home. Industry, so- 
cialistic theories, immorality, feminist movements, dev- 
astation, the preponderance in numbers of women over 
men — these and similar influences are attacking the old 
conception of the home with telling force, and all kinds 
of propositions are being put forth to solve the sex 
problem in its vital aspects. Some advocate polygamy, 
some the abolition of marriage altogether, and, if we 
may believe the reports, Germany has already adopted 
most severe, unusual, and revolting measures to increase 
her population. With all of these things attacking the 
home, we are not sure what adaptations the future will 
force us to make in our ideas. 

The same situation pertains in relation to educa- 
tion. There is a revolt against the German language, 
German books, and German scholarship generally, and 
this is likely to continue for some time after the war. 
When we consider the tremendous influence which Ger- 



174 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

many has been exerting in the educational world, we 
can easily see that this protest must have an abiding 
effect on our ideas. Education will also be affected by 
the military or anti-military spirit which prevails after 
the war, since the schools will be called upon to support 
and inculcate the doctrine which is finally adopted. 

We are not even sure what our morality is to be to- 
morrow. To-day things are tolerated and excused that 
would have caused a storm of protest yesterday. Pro- 
fanity, liquor drinking, sexual immorality are sweeping 
Europe like a storm. The niceties that have always 
hedged the association between the sexes have been 
largely discarded, and the tone of womanhood has been 
lowered appreciably by the industrial life and the gen- 
eral situation brought by the war. It is extremely 
possible that after the war some of the things which we 
have always branded as sinful may be tolerated more 
easily, and on the other hand the reverse may be true 
in certain instances. In all of these departments of our 
life, and in all others also, changes and adaptations are 
likely to be made. And we need not expect religion to 
be the exception; in this department we are likely to 
see more far-reaching changes of attitude than else- 
where. 

"We may be quite sure of one thing, however, and that 
is that religion will not die. Nothing is more certain 
than that, and all the signs of the times confirm it. The 
Church might die, Christianity may suffer, but the vital 
principle of religion will not depart from the world. 
And this is true not alone because religion is implanted 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 175 

deeply in human nature; the fact is evidenced by the 
deepest movements of our society to-day. It is an age 
in which the Church is attacked very roundly ; it is an 
unchristian age; hut it is not an age without religion. 
This war has revealed the need of God as men before 
have not known it. Everything else has failed. Ma- 
terialism has run its course, and even the soldiers in 
the trenches seem to understand that the ultimate cause 
of this war was unbelief, irreverence, godlessness, wick- 
edness, and the worship of matter. They, of all people, 
understand how badly the world stands in need of God 
and spiritual reality. It is the easiest thing in the 
world to talk personal religion to a soldier, because the 
subject is always at the very top of his mind ready to 
come to utterance; usually it is smothered or covered 
by profanity and carelessness, yet it is there, and he 
knows that there must be a God somewhere in this uni- 
verse who is capable of helping this suffering world. 
In a real sense, in spite of immorality and anti-eccle- 
siasticism, the war has given birth to the God-idea. 
And this insures the perpetuation of religion. 

Then the philosophic situation in the world is ex- 
tremely favorable to religion. Tyndall's Belfast ad- 
dress could not get a hearing in Europe to-day. The 
whole attitude upon which it stood has been changed. 
The scientific orgy of the nineteenth century issued in 
a mechanistic philosophy which professed to bring all 
the operations of the world, the seen and the unseen, 
under the reign of physical force, matter, and motion. 
It ruled out all ideas of a spiritual world and denied 



176 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

the presence of an animating principle in man. So 
confident did this mechanism become that it openly pro- 
fessed to have dethroned forever all of the tenets upon 
which our religion stood. 

But in the latter part of the nineteenth and the first 
few years of the twentieth century came the great 
idealistic philosophers with their insistence upon Life. 
This confounded the mechanistic doctors, for they 
suddenly discovered that they had left Life out of 
their calculations and were wholly unable to deal 
with it. The result was that scientific materialism 
lost the place it had held and was reduced to the posi- 
tion of a starveling seeking shelter among the vagaries. 
Even before the war there were but one or two people on 
earth who still cared to defend this system through the 
reviews, and since the war broke out even they have 
been silenced. The war brought such things as patri- 
otism, generosity, unselfishness, sacrifice, devotion to 
principle, duty, and kindred sentiments forward, and 
in their presence mechanism had to slink away; it 
had no place in its machine for such spiritual elements 
as these. And the people were so intent upon them 
that materialism was smothered. Even such a man 
as H. G. Wells needed nothing but this war to shock 
him out of his religious indifference and give him a 
vital appreciation of the spiritual values of the uni- 
verse. To-day, if we could think about philosophy, 
idealism holds the field unchallenged; it held the field 
even before the war. And idealism is closely akin to 
religion; in a certain real sense we may say it is re- 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 177 

ligion. It must either issue in religion, else it must 
evaporate into the thin air and be lost. Herein lies 
one of the strongest proofs that religion will not be lost 
out of this world. 

Then religion is in the very air to-day. Men reject 
Christianity and they attack the Church, but they set 
great store by religion. The presence of so many vaga- 
ries and isms proves this. Christian Science, Russell- 
ism, Dowieism, social-serviceism, Invisible-Kingism, 
and the long list of cults and creeds that are pulling 
away from Christianity and trying to set up new re- 
ligions all testify to the fact that religion is still with 
us, and will be with us. The soldiers have it especially, 
although they are about the most unchristian of the lot. 
They have natural religion, it has been said over and 
over again. And it is true. Over and over again I 
have heard them of their own will bring up the subject 
of religion, always to abuse the Church and the clergy, 
always to predict their overthrow, but always to end 
with the remark, "But we must be careful to see that 
religion does not suffer." I heard one man make a 
slighting remark about religion and he was instantly re- 
buked by a comrade in these words: "There's a ? ell of 
a lot of us as believes religion's a damn good thing for 
the world." And he was commended by the crowd, 
although practically all of them had expressed them- 
selves unfavorably concerning the Church, the clergy, 
and the entire paraphernalia of Christianity generally. 
There are a multitude of other signs which plainly sig- 
nify that religion is still in the world and that it is 



178 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

attracting a wider attention than was given to it a few 
years ago. 

But this religion is not the Christian religion. Nat- 
ural religion is the best name for it. It is unformulat- 
ed and undefined; it has no system and no interpreta- 
tion; it implies no duties and offers no program of 
service. In this state it cannot exist. It will filter out 
into the air and lose itself, or else it will exist as a 
baneful influence amongst us. This natural religion, 
existing in the state of dreamy idealism and having no 
moral consciousness, will issue in positive immorality, 
it will unstabilize our thinking and our social action, 
it will give us no method of gathering up religious in- 
fluences and moving them on the social tasks of life. 
It is in that very direction that the current is moving 
at the present time. 

Not only is this religion not Christianity, but there 
is a positive and well-defined effort being made to 
disconnect it from Christianity and the Church, and 
from all other forms of organization likewise. Its 
leaders outspokenly prefer to have their religion 
drift in the air, to be breathed and felt once in a while 
and used for purposes of personal satisfaction and 
exhilaration; but they will not have it attached 
to a Church, or organization, they want no clergy, 
no propagating movement, no devices through which to 
develop, enhance, and cultivate it. And, strange to say, 
some of these leaders who thus urge base their objection 
to an organization to embody religion upon social 
grounds! In this they are worse than silly; it is the 



KECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 179 

most positive inanity to imagine that our social prob- 
lems and needs can ever be solved and met by religion 
when that religion is detached from all embodiments 
through which effort and sentiment can be mobilized, 
multiplied, and expressed. Yet that is exactly what is 
proposed by the Countess of Warwick and other leaders 
of the new religion, which is the oldest kind of re- 
ligion. 

A deliberate attempt is also being made to destroy 
all systematized thought upon which religion rests. 
Theology is discarded, the Bible rejected, our doctrines 
repudiated, and everything that we have used to give a 
mental stability and direction to our faith is set aside. 
We are left with an odor, a sweet smell, a cooling breeze 
that drifts by, a sentiment that attracts the mind once in 
a while — and we are told that this is the religion of the 
future! It is no religion at all; it is an emasculation 
that cannot live, and cannot be comprehended while it 
does live. If any reasonable, well balanced, and ordi- 
narily intelligent man can obtain any sensible meaning 
from Mr. Wells' theory of an invisible King," I should 
personally like to be enlightened by that man. I will 
venture the assertion that on the basis of pure common 
intelligence Mr. Wells himself does not understand his 
own writings about "a finite god," and God being 
youth, courage, and the like. Words without an anchor, 
without a message, without a meaning — that is what 
comes of most of this material that is printed as reli- 
gious theorizing. 

Now all of this must not be allowed to obscure the 



180 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

minds and hearts of the people. Yet they have been 
weaned away from the Church as it has operated and 
from Christianity as we have expressed it. They must 
be drawn back — not for the sake of the Church and 
Christianity, but for the sake of the people and the 
world. This means that our religion must be rejuve- 
nated, filled with deeper meaning, and quickened by a 
newer spirit. To outline the details of such a process 
of rejuvenation is a task which cannot be accomplished 
at the present time and at one sitting. The best we 
can hope to do is to mark out the way which such a 
process will be very likely to take. And that way will 
be found along the line of a new harmony and a new 
correlation between religion and theology and between 
religion and sociology. 

When we speak of a new correlation between religion 
and theology we broach a subject with which it is diffi- 
cult to deal, but with which some sort of dealing is im- 
peratively demanded. It is a matter of common accep- 
tance that theology has fallen into disrepute in these 
modern times. It has become the butt of ridicule and 
slighting remarks not only from those who might be 
expected to oppose it but also from ministers and Chris- 
tian leaders who might be expected to uphold it. The 
world has moved, attitudes have changed, and social 
problems have taken on new phases, but theology has re- 
mained practically the same. Each contemplated ad- 
vance has been strenuously opposed, and by the very 
persons whose position in the Church qualified them 
to speak for the system, and thus the science has been 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 181 

effectually divorced from the life of our times. When 
it was discovered that conservatives would not permit 
a restatement or an adaptation of theological formulas 
the enlightened world contented itself with ignoring 
them. ~No other course was open, and so it has come 
about that practically no persons take theology serious- 
ly to-day, unless it be those invested with Episcopal au- 
thority, whose influence on the life of the times is nil. 
Many ministers, and the brainiest and best of them in 
many cases, no longer feel it incumbent upon them to 
accept the ancient creeds to which their Churches stand 
theoretically committed, and the laity neither know nor 
care that such creeds exist. 

This spirit has brought about a change unconsciously. 
It has not, indeed, changed the statements but it has 
revolutionized the whole theological attitude of the 
Church. So it has come to pass that most of the 
Churches have one theology in their confessions and 
quite another in actual operation in the minds and 
spirits of the people. Eor example, predestination may 
still be recorded in certain theological treatises the 
authority of which has never been revoked, yet it has 
not the least influence in congregations that worship 
under the theoretical flag of Calvinism. The ancient 
two-nature doctrine of the person of Christ still stands, 
but who believes it % Its adherents have been scattered 
so that in the number one can find scarcely any represen- 
tative people. The same is largely true of the doctrines 
of literal inspiration, the atonement, soteriology, and 
many others. The spirit of the people is abreast of 



182 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

the times, but the formulated statements have drifted 
to the rear; so for practical purposes we might throw 
overboard all the formulated statements of theology 
which we possess and never miss them — or we may 
keep them and never be aware that they exist. So little 
interest do we have in these creeds to-day that heresy 
trials are practically unknown. 

In this situation it surely seems as if those inter- 
ested in scientific statements of the foundations of our 
faith would be intensely concerned for restatements that 
would preserve the fundamentals and again commend 
them to the people. But they are not. One of the 
strangest facts in the life of religion to-day is the fact 
that in the present situation the conservatives are de- 
termined to keep these formulations just as they are, 
in the same state in which the people have rejected them. 
One of the great Methodist communions recently made 
an attempt to restate its creed, under the leadership of 
its most noted author and teacher of theological works. 
Instantly conservatism, under the leadership of the 
superior clergy, put up a formidable opposition, and 
since the superior clergy possessed absolute power over 
the common clergy the movement was decisively de- 
feated. 

It is perfectly clear that religion and theology can 
never be harmonized and correlated again as long as 
this attitude is kept up. Try as we will, preach as we 
may, legislate to our heart's content, write for the re- 
ligious papers as much as we choose — the people of a 
modern world are not going to take seriously again the 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 183 

ancient theological conceptions whicH they have now 
forgotten. 

We should not worry about such a state of affairs 
were it not for the fact that theology is of great and 
vital importance to a people. When the modern world 
considers theology as such ja worthless remnant of 
the past, fit only to be discarded and serving when re- 
tained only to prevent and obscure religious values, it 
makes a mistake from which it is certain to suffer. Re- 
ligion cannot be safely divorced from systematic state- 
ments and mental processes. Such a divorce gives us 
an unattached mysticism, a sentimental emotionalism 
that is more likely to issue in vagaries and immorality 
than in Christian character ; this is the process through 
which the world to-day teems with foolish isms and 
fantastic religious movements of a thousand sorts. We 
need a systematized theology, without, however, the pas- 
sion for system which possessed our fathers and which 
gave us some of the hard and fast doctrines which have 
little to commend them except that they dovetail excel- 
lently into other similar doctrines. 

Now it is quite clear that the theology of the future 
must not make the old mistake of explaining all things, 
seen and unseen, earthly and eternal. If God, Christ, 
and the Bible do not see fit to reveal to a scientific cer- 
tainty the intricacies of the atonement, the person of 
Christ, the time of the parousia, the nature of future 
punishment, the location and extent of heaven, we may 
be quite sure that a theology which we can build upon 
the revelation given us through them will fail in ex- 



184 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

plaining these things. We have taken the position that 
theology must begin where revelation leaves off and 
amplify it; we must understand that theology has no 
function except to assist us in applying religious facts 
and influences to the living of our lives in this en- 
vironment. 

Thus our theology should reconstruct itself along 
lines of personality and social endeavor. Its primary 
function is to develop a personal religious life, to ad- 
just this life to the social tasks and needs of a modern 
world, and in connection with those tasks to call out 
the creative genius of a religious man. It is designed 
to hold up before religious people, and through them to 
the world, the supreme value of spiritual elements, and 
thus enable Christian men to project these values into 
the various departments of this world's activity. The 
greatest need of the religious world to-day seems to be 
a new theology, a theology written from the social point 
of view and designed to plunge Christianity into the 
very midst of the struggles of this world. We know 
enough about heaven and hell, death and immortality, 
atonement and the person of Christ — at any rate we 
know all that we are likely to know about these things. 
But we do not yet understand how to live in this 
world. We do not know what the duties of a religious 
man actually are. We are actually confused about what 
is right and what is wrong. We must understand where 
this world is going and when we may know it has ar- 
rived. If theology can teach us these things it may 
live. 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 185 

!Now our task in this regard is very like that faced 
by the early Church; we again must make natural re- 
ligion issue into Christianity. The whole world is full 
of religion and notions about God, duty, and salvation. 
But these notions do not affect life; they do not even 
make those who hold them better men. Upon them, 
however, Christianity, or any other system, must build. 
It is not so much a question of meeting and overcom- 
ing these things as it is a question of commending our 
faith to their adherents so that they may be absorbed 
into our body. In the process of absorption the extra- 
neous features will slough off. Such was the process in 
the early Church. Christianity did not convert the 
world, she absorbed it. Our enemies have made much 
of the fact that Constantine simply converted pagan 
temples into Christian churches by an edict, and that 
paganism merged into the new religion because it be- 
came popular. The basis of this complaint is not 
valid for a complaint. This was the right process, 
whatever we may think about the methods of its ac- 
complishment. We are not called to destroy all that 
differs, for we must know that these varying religions 
express truth and are a part of the world's search for 
God. Our mission is one of absorption, and we trust in 
the transcending superiority of Christianity to keep 
itself pure while it accomplishes the process of amalga- 
mation. 

While our task is remarkably similar to that of early 
Christianity, it is much more difficult — we can make 
this statement with a full consciousness of its meaning 



186 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

and implication. It will be more difficult because we 
must commend the already familiar. We do not have 
the charm of novelty, the appeal of sacrifice, and the 
leverage of the attraction of the Christian superiority 
over anything else known. Here lay the power of the 
early fathers, here lies the power of missionaries to-day. 
But in our situation we have to stop a trend that is un- 
mistakably away from us and to turn it backward to- 
ward the thing which it left. To many this will seem 
like retrogression, this going back. Of course the re- 
ligion to which they return will not be the same in 
spirit, but the difference will perhaps be too subtle to 
be caught by the mass. And the fact that the creation 
of the difference will be bitterly opposed by some of 
those influential in the Church will make the task 
doubly difficult. 

In the recreation of theology in the light of the prob- 
lems before us the most important element will doubt- 
less be the making of a new apologetic. Under the old 
method of defending and commending the faith the 
world has gradually slipped away from us, and it will 
be useless effort to attempt the task of drawing it back 
with these same arguments. It will require an apolo- 
getic that is preeminently social and that rests itself 
upon an idealistic philosophy. We may as well dis- 
continue the process, in which many writers have re- 
cently engaged, of commending Christianity by adopt- 
ing half -compromises with materialism. The science of 
the nineteenth century issued in a mechanistic philos^ 
ophy and sadly injured religion. Its advance was not 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 187 

stopped by our defenses and neither did we benefit by 
our attempts at adaptations. Christian leaders were 
quite foolish in their opposition to the advance of scien- 
tific knowledge, and when these adaptations were at- 
tempted it appeared as if we were making a compro- 
mise for the sake of saving our faces and a remnant 
of our system. The saviors of religion were men who 
labored not for religion at all, who were not even on 
good terms, in many cases, with the Church; men like 
Eucken, Bergson, James, and their fellow laborers de- 
stroyed the mechanistic scheme by upholding the tenets 
of idealism, and they thereby saved religion, because it 
cannot exist save in an idealistic atmosphere. We, 
therefore, are under the necessity of insisting upon the 
idealistic position at all times and under all circum- 
stances. Nor must we be caught by the attractions of 
Pragmatism, which after all is akin to materialism in 
that it makes this world and its society the final test of 
truth. It afTords*us no final criterion for the judgment 
of reality, and in the end it will put an effectual stop to 
the search for it. 

And the new apologetic must give us a new view of 
revelation and the facts upon which we base our faith. 
No longer can the old ideas of the Bible be maintained. 
Literalism and verbal theories of inspiration are thor- 
oughly mechanistic. But we have depended upon them, 
and we have as yet scarcely passed away from the old 
proof-text method of using revelation for purposes of 
argument. Here again we retain in theory what has 
been rejected in practice; for the great body of the 



188 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

people no longer regard revelation in this light, even 
thongh the Church has not yet had the courage and wis- 
dom to repudiate the old doctrines. We can no longer 
maintain faith in the Bible on these premises. Literal- 
ism gives us the fantastic vagaries like pre-millenarian- 
ism, with its teaching about the apostasy of the world 
and the necessity for the wrecking of this social order 
in order to achieve the Kingdom. If the adherents of 
this scheme were thoroughgoing and logical they would 
be outbreaking sinners and criminals and they would 
urge crime as a duty under God, since this is the re- 
vealed and prophesied will of God; surely if God can- 
not establish His Kingdom until this world goes to hell, 
we are justified in sending it to hell as speedily as pos- 
sible. 

Ingersoll and other superficial infidels like him used 
the position of the Church in discrediting the Bible, 
and they would have succeeded if that position had been 
maintained. The Bible can be torn to pieces and dis- 
credited if we base our defense of it upon the literalistic 
method; it will be a happy day when this is officially 
recognized as it is to-day unofficially recognized. What 
message would Ingersoll have to-day ? None ! The so- 
called Higher Criticism, which is still a bugaboo in 
some quarters, has saved us by giving us a new view of 
inspiration and revelation, so that it is no longer neces- 
sary to dispute the accepted and demonstrated facts of 
science and history in order to have religious faith 
founded upon the Bible. And a crying need of our time 
is for a recognition of these newer and better views and. 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 189 

an educational movement which will insure their ac- 
ceptance by the masses of people who affiliate with our 
Churches and call themselves Christian. Let literal 
interpretation go forever. Let verbal inspiration go 
with it. Then, and not until then, can we have a dy- 
namic and intelligent faith and an apologetic which 
will enable us to defend the Bible before all comers. 
Then pre-millenarianism and its allied nuisances will 
disappear and a consistent and intelligent faith will 
come into its own. 

I recently read an article in which the Kaiser of the 
German Empire was identified with the biblical Anti- 
christ because there were six letters in the name, be- 
cause he has six sons, and because the number of the 
letters as they stand in the English alphabet, with a six 
placed by each, total 666 when added. Another writer 
has found that the automobile with electric head-lights 
fulfills an ancient prophecy and proves that "the end of 
the age" is near at hand. Another has taken the trouble 
to find out how many people travel on ships and rail- 
way trains in a given time, finding thereby the ful- 
fillment of the prediction that "men shall run to and 
fro" and the speedy destruction of the world. Others 
find signs of "the end" in the growth of schools and 
colleges, the spread of culture, the circulation of the 
Bible, and a great line of other facts. And these fool- 
ish interpretations are accepted by large numbers of 
people because they seem reasonable according to the 
theory of inspiration and interpretation they have been 
taught. A theological school is in existence to teach 



190 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

these vagaries. Such a method makes the most ingenious 
man the best interpreter of holy writ. And if we start 
from their premises we will have difficulty in refuting 
them. But it is needless to point out that they are 
bringing the Bible and our religion into serious dis- 
repute with the intelligent world, and we are helpless 
because we do not have the courage to repudiate once for 
all these premises. There can be no apologetic which 
will defend the Scriptures until the tenets and the 
methods of the Higher Criticism are accepted. The 
denunciation of the Higher Criticism ought to be an 
offense that would bar any man from a Christian pulpit, 
for the historical spirit has been and will continue to 
be the best friend that the Bible possesses. 

Now the literalists and pre-millenarian faddists will 
very strenuously oppose all attempts to secure a corre- 
lation between religion and sociology. Most of them 
look upon sociology as their foe, since the betterment of 
this world would defeat the plans of God and prevent 
the establishment of the Kingdom. I recently read an 
editorial in a leading periodical of premillenarianism 
on the subject of the liquor traffic, written in reply to a 
correspondent who inquired whether Christian people 
should patronize papers accepting liquor advertisements. 
The position taken was that such things are immate- 
rial ; the prohibition movement was foolish and useless, 
because this world was in the power of "the evil one" 
and the entire order must be destroyed. While a little 
outspoken, the editor was logical and loyal to his posi- 
tion, and from his spirit there emanates the wide-spread 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 191 

antagonism to the social program of the modern Church. 

If we ever understand that the genius of Christianity 
is social we will then know that no greater duty rests 
upon us than that of harmonizing religion and sociology. 
In this direction the Church has gone a long way, 
through the estahlishment of social centers and her un- 
faltering opposition to such institutions as the saloon, 
but it is evident that she has scarcely touched the rim of 
the problem. And she will never solve it until her the- 
ology is written from the social point of view, until she 
adopts the definition that the Kingdom of God is "an 
ideal social order," and until she puts a social interpre- 
tation upon her message and the facts on which her re- 
ligion stands. 

The social interpretation of Christianity ought to in- 
clude several elements. The question of teleology must 
be settled once for all, and we must understand just 
what God intends with His world. Without an ade- 
quate teleological element no theology or system of 
philosophy can hope to secure an acceptance on the part 
of the race, for on it depends our whole conception of 
God, the world, and our own duty; it is the foundation 
of faith, for apart from this there is nothing for our 
faith to grasp. Hitherto our teleology has been per- 
sonal, and has bent all the plans of the universe to the 
end of securing the personal salvation of an individual. 
The world scheme of the old theology was fantastic 
enough ; it gave us a perfect world, then a fall into sin, 
then a long process of building back, and then the end 
of the world order at the point of beginning. Thus it 



192 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

made God work in a circle and accomplish absolutely 
nothing except the trouble of laboring millions of years 
to attain what was originally existent — a perfect world. 
Certainly there were the values of* the struggle itself 
for the sons of men, but so far as a real world order was 
concerned the plan reflected no undue credit upon the 
purposes of God. And the pre-millenarian variation 
which made the world start at absolute perfection and 
end at absolute imperfection was worse, for it made 
God positively immoral. 

In all of this the war has come to help us. If Berg- 
son's philosophy had been written after the war, it 
would no doubt have been completed by the addition of 
a teleological element, thus eliminating its glaring fault ; 
it is to be hoped that the distinguished French thinker 
will now round out his system. Men now have clearer 
ideas of God's purposes for His creation; we realize 
that in spite of the untold agony the earth has, through 
the war, taken a mighty stride forward, and it is not 
too much to believe that God's aims have been furthered. 
Even the war has brought the world closer to Christ's 
ideal of the Kingdom, for His doctrine of human broth- 
erhood has at last been accepted as the platform upon 
which all nations must henceforth stand — for that is 
the real meaning of the present passion for Democ- 
racy. 

Along this line the Church must reform her thinking. 
We must have a teleology that is social, that does full 
credit to the character of God, and that looks forward 
infinitely. This teleology must embody a program of 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 193 

human betterment, one which shall take in the interests 
of humanity on a grander scale than any program of 
which, the Church has ever dreamed before. And its 
central element must be a practical application of the 
doctrine of Democracy interpreted as a part of the very 
character of God. 

This will involve an adjustment on the part of some 
denominations in regard to their own polity ; it will not 
be possible for a Church to inject into society a demo- 
cratic principle while its own spirit remains monarchi- 
cal. The time loudly calls for the reduction of all epis- 
copal authority, the recognition of the principle that 
the Church is the laity, and that any superior clergy 
holds only as the servant of the people. Those invested 
with episcopal authority may oppose such an interpre- 
tation, yet it must be made if ecclesiastical organization 
is to harmonize with the tasks and spirit of the times. 
Recently a Methodist bishop attempted to have the 
Church denned as being composed of the bishops, the 
General Conference, and the preachers — the bishops 
being mentioned first and the laity not at all. The en- 
suing struggle between the people and the episcopacy 
in American Methodism is about to be won by the peo- 
ple; at any rate they have won all of the skirmishes 
thus far. And so it should be in all of those denomi- 
nations which do not afford a clear and unobstructed 
channel for the projection of democratic principles. 

The task of democratization will be for the Church 
a peculiarly difficult one; and yet its accomplishment 
is imperatively demanded to avoid an antagonism of the 



194 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

spirit in the Church with the spirit of the age* an an- 
tagonism which is already felt and which will he fatal 
to the influence of religions organizations if accentuated. 
Ecclesiasticism has never heen democratic ; on the con- 
trary it has openly advocated and gloried in autocracy. 
The people themselves have never ohtained any recog- 
nition in the councils of the Church except over the op- 
position of episcopal interests. Ecclesiasticism seems 
to have an instinctive distrust of the people, and has 
always sought to hedge them ahout with safeguards and 
harriers ; it has created an Index to determine the chan 
nels through which truth shall reach them, it has expur- 
gated and suppressed news and reports of Church af- 
fairs in religious journals, and in a multitude of ways 
it has always proceeded upon the assumption that a su- 
perior clergy must he extremely careful in allowing 
freedom of investigation and information to the people. 
Even to-day there is scarcely a Church periodical on 
earth which has the courage to give to the people all 
the facts concerning the movements in the life of the 
Church, and allow them to form their opinions in the 
light of these facts. 

In a recent conversation, an editor of official and 
public documents for a certain denomination earnestly 
contended that it was a part of his duty to expurgate 
speeches which had heen delivered, when it appeared 
to him that "the speaker had not represented himself or 
when he had made remarks for which he might after- 
wards he sorry." The fundamental principle of the 
journalist, to tell the exact truth without hias and allow 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 195 

the people to reach their own conclusions, has not yet 
reached the Church. Therefore it has not yet grasped 
the first element in democracy, which is confidence in 
the people. 

On one occasion I wrote an editorial in which I de- 
nounced the anarchy and the fanaticism of the Russian 
Bolsheviks and declared that the Church must oppose 
the Red Terror. The article was prefaced by a state- 
ment to the effect that the Church was not primarily in- 
terested in forms of government, that she believed in 
the people, and that if it developed that the Russian 
people sincerely desired a Soviet government we would 
be content. This statement aroused hot resentment on 
the part of certain Churchmen; although this is the 
attitude of the Peace Conference, the Allied govern- 
ments, and the government of the United States, these 
Churchmen declared that any theory which would allow 
a Soviet government in Russia, even if the people 
wanted it, was subversive. 

A few years ago a large number of prominent and 
representative laymen in a certain denomination 
launched a movement for a greater degree of democracy 
in their Church and for a reduction of episcopal power. 
Their aims were set forth in a pamphlet, bearing the 
names of all the sponsors of the movement, which was 
rather widely circulated. The result was a strong pro- 
test upon the part of many ecclesiastical leaders, and 
the movement met the almost unanimous opposition of 
the Church press. And the basis of much of the denun- 
ciation heaped upon the movement, and the laymen who 



196 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

were urging it, was not the lack of merit in the cause 
itself, hut the fact that the men had published and 
distributed a pamphlet ! 

These are indications of the fact that there is an in- 
herent tendency somewhere in the Church to distrust 
the people. It is a survival of autocracy and partakes 
of the very essence of Prussianism. In such a day as 
this it is imperatively demanded that the people be 
taken into the confidence of the Church, that all the facts* 
be placed before them and all the power be reposed in 
them. Otherwise it will be impossible to avoid a con- 
flict between the Church and the spirit abroad in the 
world. Having repudiated autocracy in government, 
men will not longer tolerate autocracy in their religion. 

Our religious organizations are now under the neces- 
sity of providing an expressional agency through which 
religion can be interpreted into service, and the very 
first step should be a program of religious education 
which will reach the last member of the last congrega- 
tion. Religious people have never been able to pro- 
foundly influence society because most of them have 
been wholly untrained. Their ideas of the Bible will 
not stand the tests of intelligence, and as long as they 
hold such ideas, they will be open to the attacks of 
rationalism; and many of them will continue to throw 
over their faith when they at last discover that their 
old notions cannot be defended. Shall the Church con- 
tinue to allow her people to confuse such notions with 
fundamentals ? Shall she continue to oppose giving to 
her people those modern interpretations which her lead- 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 197 

ers know to be true? It must not be! We need 
above everything else in the Church a clear and frank 
recognition of the historical approach to the Bible, and 
an educational scheme which will give the method and 
spirit to all the people. 

Along with this there should go a plan of social effort 
which will include an answer to two questions: What 
is a Christian? and What must a Christian do to be 
saved ? Neither of these questions can be answered by 
the American Church to-day, even though there be de- 
tached spirits who fully understand their implications. 
At the present time religious standards have been so 
lowered that there is very little difference between a 
"Churchman" and a "sinner." Most of our Churches 
make few distinctions ; I have known preachers to move 
heaven and earth to obtain or keep for their member- 
ship persons known to be immoral, and that without 
any thought of their reformation. I have known 
preachers to support in a political campaign a candidate 
backed by the saloon element because, forsooth, he be- 
longed to their denomination, when the opposing can- 
didate was being fought by all immoral agencies and 
enjoyed a national reputation for integrity and law 
enforcement in public office. In a world with such a 
keen moral consciousness as that which now prevails, 
the Church will display a great unwisdom if she does 
not look to her standards and make it impossible to 
truthfully say that there is no difference between those 
inside and those outside the fold. There should be a 
revival of preaching from the text, "What do ye more 



198 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

than they V We are about to lose the value of a human 
soul, and it were better to lose any other value than 
that. It can be recovered through a social gospel, one 
that rests human values not only upon the eternity of 
the individual spirit but also upon the strategic import- 
ance of the individual in the social scheme of God. 

Give us also a new missionary message and under- 
standing. JSTow we know as never before that men are 
mutually dependent, that our duties are not bounded by 
racial or national lines, that the world is a small place 
inhabited by those who are brothers. In the missionary 
program of to-morrow there must not be the idea of 
saving a soul in heaven which might otherwise be lost 
in hell; neither must it be inspired by motives of de^ 
nominational aggrandizement. Let it be lifted into the 
realm of world reconstruction and be made the leading 
element in the civilizing of the earth. Include in the 
missionary enterprise all social movements and ideas, 
and in pursuit of this the Church will have a policy 
worthy of these days. 

The truth is that nothing except missionary activity 
can save the world in the present crisis. The social or- 
der in a great part of the world has been wrecked and 
must now be rebuilt. Upon the nature of the recon- 
struction depends the weal or the woe of the Church for 
many centuries to come. If the world attempts to leave 
God out of the new order it will mean what it meant 
during the French Eevolution — a reign of terror and 
anarchy. And in the present situation — with godless 
Bolshevism rampant in all lands, with a citizenship con- 



RECONSTRUCTION IN RELIGION 199 

fused and sad at heart, with wide-spread destruction 
and poverty, with a constant trend on the part of the 
people away from Roman Catholicism toward rational- 
ism — there is very great danger that such an attempt 
will be made. Surely it will he made unless the Protes- 
tant Church of America has the courage to project 
everywhere the sanest and the most far-reaching mis- 
sionary program the world ever knew. 

The world is intoxicated with democracy. It is to be 
tried everywhere, and the people seem to believe that 
when democracy is applied to all the evils and ills of 
society the Millennium will be ushered in. This is, to 
be sure, a step in the right direction, yet democracy 
is the most dangerous experiment which has ever been 
tried. Theoretical ideas of democracy will never save 
a people or make the world safe and civilized. Mexico 
has a democracy, yet she menaces the peace of the world. 
Russia has a democracy of a kind, yet she wanders in 
anarchy and confusion. China is a democracy, yet she 
is unnumbered among civilized nations. Why are these 
lands not safe? It is because the citizenship is not of 
such a quality that democracy can rest upon it. Three- 
fourths of the people in Mexico could not read the 
Bible even if they had it to read. Seventy-five per cent, 
of the Russians are ignorant. Nine-tenths of the Chi- 
nese are illiterate. It is rather startling to reflect that 
in China there are three times as many people who 
cannot read a line as there are people of all kinds in 
the United States. And no democracy can stand that 
rests upon a citizenship which is illiterate. Now the 



200 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

whole world is to try democracy as a magic something 
which can cure its ills and evils. Yet more than half 
of the people in the world are unable to read and write 
a word of any language. In this situation the world 
which trusts simply to democracy is riding upon the 
shoals. 

When we consider this state of affairs the duty of the 
Church appears perfectly plain. That duty is to make 
sure that Christian culture and enlightenment prevail 
everywhere. It is ours to place under the democratic 
forms and conceptions of the world a citizenship which 
is educated, a people whose radical tempers are stabil- 
ized by Christian morality and wisdom. Unless this is 
done there will be universal Bolshevism, constant con- 
fusion, more wars, and the eternal threat of anarchy. 

We may trust the people to organize their govern- 
ments when the people know what Christian culture 
means. We will be free from the menace of the Bol- 
shevik when individual people are regenerated and 
educated. But so long as they languish in the densest 
sort of ignorance no stable government can be erected 
upon them, and there can be no peace for the world. 
Let us have democracy, but for the sake of the future 
the democracies must be safe for the world. And they 
will be safe only when they are Christian. 



CHAPTEE IX 

THE CHALLENGE OF THE WAR TO THE CHURCH 

When the war broke out it brought immediate con- 
fusion to the Church. War always brings such con- 
fusion, because it is the negation of the Christian mes- 
sage of good-will and loving fellowship. On this the 
Church has stood for twenty centuries and the world 
has accepted the doctrine as an ideal; so universally 
had this ideal come to be acknowledged that many be- 
lieved Christianity had been able to weave its spirit 
into the social order so thoroughly that wars had become 
impossible. Then the unprecedented catastrophe came, 
and all the preaching and influence of two thousand 
years was negatived in a day. It seemed as if the earth 
had officially forsaken the Christian platform. 

It is said that Mr. H. G. Wells, at the outbreak of 
hostilities, spent some time in the graveyard of a 
country church, reflecting after this fashion : "Here is 
the most influential and respected of all human institu- 
tions, and it stands upon a platform of brotherhood. It 
operates throughout the civilized world, and no com- 
munity is apart from its spirit and message. Why has 
there not emanated from this institution a power which 

201 



202 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

would have made this war impossible?" And because 
he could not answer the question Mr. Wells conjured 
up a fantastic religion of his own. 

Out of the general confusion arose the cry which we 
have heard so oftentimes, "Christianity has failed." 
The rationalist press took it up and made it into a far- 
flung propaganda. Christian apologists did not reply, 
because in the general confusion there were no clear 
visioned prophets to speak. To say that it was a 
righteous war was to make no reply at all, for this 
was conceded on all hands; it was conceded on both 
sides, for the Christian Church was as influential in 
the Teutonic countries as in those lands mobilized under 
the Allied banners. Two sets of Christians sent pray- 
ers to the same God for exactly opposite favors, invok- 
ing His support for irreconcilable principles. The crux 
of the situation did not concern the justice or the in- 
justice of the issues involved; it was the stark fact 
that in all the centuries of Christian history our religion 
had not persuaded the nations that brotherhood was a 
practical principle in international affairs, and that 
there was a better way of adjusting disputes than that 
of resorting to force, bloodshed, and barbarism. The 
Church was powerless against such a charge of failure 
as this, for it bore its truthfulness on its very face. 

As the war progressed the confusion deepened, and 
there grew up in Europe a positive antagonism to the 
Church. Eor this there were various reasons. The 
Church really had no message for the times, and this 
was a source of disappointment even to Christian people. 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 203 

The war came so suddenly and so unexpectedly that the 
religious forces of Europe had no time for preparation, 
and when suddenly confronted with the crisis they were 
powerless to meet it with a dynamic pronouncement and 
program. The Church continued to preach the same old 
platitudes, and the people who nocked to the shrine 
when the carnage began failed to find the hope, the 
solace, the vision which they desired. They found 
only sermons urging patriotism, demanding enlisting, 
and justifying the nation's course, the very same things 
they were hearing everywhere else. And so the in- 
creased congregations so apparent at the beginning soon 
diminished. 

Then the doctrine of prayer began to be discounted. 
We had taught a theory of prayer which caused people 
to believe that there was a special providence for those 
who prayed and for those whose friends prayed for them, 
that its benefits were physical and objective, that it could 
actually change the mind and purposes of God. Never 
has there been so much praying as during the opening 
months of the war. But the course of events soon ex- 
ploded that theory of prayer. The praying soldier fell 
by the side of the one who knew no God to whom he 
could pray, and the sons and loved ones of millions 
of devout people were laid to rest in Flanders Field 
with the friends of atheists, infidels, and sinners. So 
they began to doubt the efficacy of prayer, which meant 
that they doubted everything they had been taught about 
God. Their trouble, to be sure, was with a mistaken 



204 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

notion of prayer, but it was the only notion the masses 
had ever been taught. 

Then there came about the wide-spread reign of wick- 
edness, a social condition most terrible and one which 
even to-day threatens the welfare of society and the 
very future of the race. In regard to this situation the 
Church did nothing. There was no attempt to correct 
the evil, no effort to save the people. She stood per- 
fectly helpless in the face of such a condition of im- 
morality as Europe had never known before, and ap- 
peared so out of touch with life that she did not even 
realize into what a state the world was drifting. By 
this apathy, this inaction, this lack of message and ma- 
chinery for such a crisis, she contributed still further 
to her own undoing and the general dissatisfaction. 

Again, the actions and attitudes of the Church towards 
the war were not calculated to add to her influence, 
especially in England. While all other classes of the 
population were taken into the army, the young clergy 
were exempted from service ; and the exemption was in- 
sisted upon by the leaders until an antagonistic public 
sentiment had crystallized, and then it was too late to 
undo the evil. The hierarchy of the Anglican Church 
gave support to the liquor traffic, and encouraged im- 
morality by advising soldiers to marry, for the sake of 
the race, before departing for the fronts. They angered 
the military chiefs by an alleged interference with train- 
ing and discipline through opposition to athletic games 
on Sunday in the camps, and they infuriated the gen- 
eral populace by their stern objections to a policy of 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 205 

reprisals against German cities when the enemy mur- 
dered helpless women and children by air raids on un- 
defended towns. 

At the same time there grew up the opinion that the 
head of the Roman Catholic Church, which is the con- 
trolling religious force in many of the warring coun- 
tries, was pro-German and desired the defeat of the 
allied cause. There were many foundations for this 
prevalent belief. The Roman Catholics in Ireland, 
openly led by the leaders of the Church, connived with 
the enemy, staged a revolution in the most serious mo- 
ment of the war, and absolutely refused to allow con- 
scription. In Canada and in other dominions of the 
British Empire the opposition of the Catholic element 
to the war and conscription was so marked that rebel- 
lions were feared. The Pope refused to denounce the 
invasion of Belgium specifically and dealt only in plati- 
tudes relative to the unspeakable outrages of Germany, 
even when perpetrated on Catholic peoples; his peace 
effort embodied a proposal entirely satisfactory to the 
Central Powers, but which none of the Allies could 
accept. It was known that the Pope cherished a deep 
hatred against Italy and Prance and expected no favors 
from England ; on the other hand he was closely linked 
to the Hapsburgs of Austria, some of the German states 
were officially Catholic, and through the Centrum they 
exercised a practical balance of power in the Empire. 
Therefore, if he hoped through the war to obtain a rec- 
ognition of temporal authority, it was evident that all 
of his interests lay with the Central allies. And when 



206 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

it was discovered that the virtual head of the enemy 
spy system in Italy was in the Vatican, an ex-officer in 
the German army whom the Pope had elevated and re- 
tained over Italian protests, the suspicion deepened into 
a conviction. 

In this situation the lot of the Church was unenvi 
ahle. Owing to her divisions it was impossible for her 
resources to he mobilized and moved against the prob* 
lems created by the war even if there had been any 
clear recognition of the character of such problems. 
Aside from furnishing chaplains, who were taken out 
of her hands the moment they entered the army, there 
was little for the Church to do in a cooperative way. 
There was no distinctive responsibility which the gov- 
ernment could entrust to her ; the work which the Church 
would otherwise have been expected to do was given to 
welfare agencies, because the Church proper had wasted 
her energies and rendered herself impotent by internal 
dissensions. Even in America it was necessary for the 
government to actually go to the extreme of forbidding 
the doing of distinctive work in the camps by the 
Church. 

These are the counts against the Church, all weighty 
and all reflecting upon her a degree of blame. Let us 
frankly recognize this. There is, however, another side 
to the case. Accepting fully all the condemnation 
which can justly be assigned to her, the Protestant 
Church, especially in America, where many of the stric- 
tures against the European Church do not apply, has a 
right to be heard in reply. Her preachers have nearly 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 207 

all been patriotic and self-sacrificing in their devotion 
to the national cause, and they have perhaps done more 
than any other class to consolidate the people with a 
deep conviction of the justice of the allied cause. She 
has stripped herself of preachers in supplying men for 
chaplains and workers in the various welfare organiza- 
tions, furnishing to such organizations more workers 
perhaps than any four or five other trades or professions 
combined. Behind them all stands the spirit which is 
the product of the Church, for she has given to the world 
the atmosphere which makes welfare work possible. 
Even the liberality of the nations, through which they 
have obtained their millions, comes from the Church; 
if it is not a sound argument to point out the fact that 
most of this wealth has come from religious people, it 
remains true that her long teaching and training in the 
matter of stewardship and generosity has been the lead- 
ing element in the large giving on the part of the 
public. 

Nor is that all. While the fundamental principles of 
Christianity may have been somewhat negatived by the 
war, these same principles are still the most influential 
factors in the war. Whence came the spirit of horror 
which swept the world when the war broke out, the re- 
volt against cruelty and outrageous conduct even in 
the strain of the conflict, the resentment of the world 
against a nation which broke its plighted word ? These 
things are reflections of the conceptions of fairness, love, 
and brotherhood, which religion has spread abroad in 
the lands. Why is democracy the slogan of the world ? 



208 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

Why do nations strive to show that they were not to 
blame, that they have no motives of conquest, that their 
aims are altruistic % Why do they insist that the rights 
of small and helpless nationalities shall be conserved? 
These are new things under the sun, and they emanate 
from the Christian attitude which the Church has pro- 
jected into society. For democracy is nothing more 
than a political application of the doctrine of the broth- 
erhood of man. This is the proper field for the opera- 
tions of the Church, and here her failure has been only 
relative. 

But the Church obtains small credit for her work 
when it reaches the point where it is recognized as so 
necessary that the governments must take it over. This 
is notably true in the great systems of public hospitals 
and public schools; few people think of giving the re- 
ligious organizations of the world credit for these things 
which were begun by them. So it is perfectly natural 
that the world should overlook the values which she has 
projected into the seething world and center criticisms 
against her blunders and the helplessness connected with 
the uncompleted parts of her program. The failures, so 
called, of the Church are simply the fields which lie 
beyond. 

What lies before the Church now, with the coming 
of peace ? Her entire program lies before her, broad- 
ened and magnified a hundred fold by the greatness of 
the present hour. Evangelistic power, educational 
genius, missionary vision — never was there such a de- 
mand for them. The challenge to the Church to-day 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 209 

is mightier than it has ever been at any other moment 
of the world's history. When Christ gave to His friends 
the great commission to preach the gospel to every crea- 
ture, the specific responsibility upon them was not great- 
er than the specific responsibility now upon the Church. 
It not only comes out of the world's need, but it con- 
cerns her own life and self-preservation. And it is not 
too much to say that if she fails to respond on a scale 
commensurate with the needs and visions of such a time 
as this the days of her influence and her life are num- 
bered. In a world of human need — a need for the very 
things which the Church has always professed to be able 
to give — she stands, criticized, doubted, ridiculed, and 
condemned. The eyes of the earth are upon her in anx- 
iety, in hope, in suspicion — but hardly in expectancy. 
If the Church is to save herself and the world, the effort 
she must make will go far beyond the dreams of the 
men of a past generation. 

We can obtain an idea of the task before the Church 
by visualizing the world situation, for the task must be 
a world task in such a day as this and it must relate 
itself to all the needs of all the people of all the nations. 
In a world survey, what do we find ? The whole earth 
in ruin unspeakable. Under little white crosses lie mil- 
lions, representing the best blood and brain of the 
world. Millions of homes are bereaved, children are or- 
phaned and left without hope in the world, refugees 
wander in droves about the face of the earth without 
places to lay their heads, unnumbered hearts are torn 
and bleeding with unspeakable grief. 



£10 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

The fairest fields of Prance and Belgium are devas- 
tated and ruined. Towns, cities, and villages are black- 
ened piles of shapeless debris, with rank weeds where 
happy children used to play and the silence of death 
where industry used to hum. Homes, mills, mines, fac- 
tories, farms, stores — all these are gone, and their places 
have been taken by ruin, death, and shallow graves. 
Churches are but shattered piles of stone, art treasures 
of priceless value have been swept into nothingness, col- 
leges are closed or wrecked, and all the processes of spir- 
itual culture have been stopped. 

Nations have starved themselves in the struggle. Raw 
materials have been shot away and wasted, while debts 
have accumulated which may not be paid in a thousand 
years. Immorality and vice hold sway in all the towns 
and cities of Europe and the people have all but for- 
saken and lost their moral consciousness. And the souls 
of men, women, and little children are charged with 
hatred and venom. It were impossible to think ade- 
quately upon the moral, spiritual, and physical wreck- 
age which the war has spilled upon a suffering world. 

The world must be rebuilt, and upon a surer founda- 
tion. There is no comfort for the sorrowing, no hope 
of future peace, if Christianity is left out of the re- 
building process. We must reconstruct upon a Christian 
basis. Into the process we must inject the spirit of 
Christ, and the values of a Protestant faith must be 
woven into the very warp and woof of the new social 
order. There are orphanages, schools, hospitals, benev- 
olent movements, Churches needed in every land of 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 211 

Europe, and only American Protestantism can provide 
and maintain them so that their influence will become 
a vital part of society. 

With all due respect to the Eoman Catholic Church, 
we know it to he inadequate for the task, and yet this 
faith controls many of the stricken lands. It stands 
upon a platform of ignorance, suppression, and extor- 
tion. It is avowedly autocratic in its very nature and 
the sworn foe of democracy. Its hierarchy believes in 
and thrives under such intrigues and diplomatic chi- 
canery as made this war possible and unavoidable. By 
its disgraceful action in the war it has lost its grip 
upon the people to such an extent that its hierarchy is 
now respected in no nation of the earth. If European 
society is left with no religious influence save that which 
this Church supplies, it will be rebuilt without any rec- 
ognition of God; France tried such a rebuilding once 
and the world obtained a lesson concerning the danger 
of a Godless social order. It must not be again. 

In France, Belgium, and Italy the Protestant faith 
now has the chance to measure steel with Koman Ca- 
tholicism with all the advantages except actual occupa- 
tion in its favor. That these lands are breaking away 
from the Poman Church is well known. In Italy it is 
impossible to bear the body of a dead Pope through the 
streets of the eternal city to its final resting place lest 
the people fling it into the Tiber, and in Prance the influ- 
ence of rationalism and freemasonry, practically unaid- 
ed by Protestantism, was able to make the government 
throw off the trammels of the establishment. Belgium, 



212 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

always loyal to the Church, deeply resents the compla- 
cency with which the Pope viewed her destruction. 
These people all remember that the Pope induced Eng- 
land to grant to Germany a respite from air raids on 
a holy day and then allowed Germany to use her own air 
fleet, freed from the necessity of protecting the border 
for the day, to destroy a Church in Paris and kill the 
worshipers and to bomb London on that same Sunday 
night. Protestantism never had such an opportunity to 
take Europe for her own as that which is to-day pre- 
sented to her. For while Europe turns against Catholi- 
cism she turns towards America ; she has seen the unsel- 
fish labors of the welfare agencies in the allied armies 
and has come to believe that American Christianity 
means altruistic and loving service. In a certain place 
an American soldier was killed and his comrades desired 
to bury him in the local cemetery, but the request was re- 
fused by the priest on the ground that the man was a 
Protestant and would defile consecrated ground. He was 
accordingly buried just outside the wall of the cemetery, 
and the humble peasants of Prance gathered to witness 
the ceremony. And in the darkness of the following 
night these peasants returned, tore down the wall of the 
church-yard, and rebuilt it around the grave of the sleep- 
ing American boy. If the simple peasants of Prance 
think more of a dead American than of the traditions 
of their Church and the dictations of their priests, may 
we not hope that America will be able to give them the 
liberal gospel of the Protestant religion? 

One of the greatest calls of the present hour is that 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 213 

which comes from the Slavic peoples of Russia, Serbia, 
and those nationalities which constituted the old Em- 
pire of Austria. Greater in extent than all the rest of 
Europe, mighty Russia to-day wanders in the blindness 
of the worst kind of anarchy, harassed and oppressed 
by murderous and perjured Bolshevik fools, who play 
upon the helpless ignorance of the masses for the fur- 
therance of fanatical schemes and personal aggrandize- 
ment. To respond to the call of Russia means not only 
to save a people and to reinstate a nation in the ways 
of orderly government; it will also enable the Church 
to take this people for the Protestant faith, and to draw 
out from them a dynamic of spiritual force which will 
do much to establish the kingdom throughout all the 
world. 

There is a sense in which we may say that Russia 
really won the war for us. Never for a moment did 
she falter in her loyalty to her Slavic kinsmen in Serbia, 
it was her mobilization in the beginning which occupied 
the almost exclusive attention of Germany, and by her 
advance she kept from the west in the most critical days 
a great Teutonic army. If Germany could have thrown 
her full strength in the west the resistance of Liege 
could not have held her, Paris would have fallen, 
France would have been rendered impotent, and the 
Central Powers would doubtless have come off victori- 
ous. In a very real sense, then, we may say that Russia 
saved the world from all the agony which would have 
been entailed by the triumph of Prussianism. 

Let us not forget that the Russian people were whole- 







2U SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

hearted in their support of the war. An unwilling gov- 
ernment confessed to Germany that Russians could not 
be restrained; the prospect of seeing Serbia humiliated 
and oppressed aroused them to fury and they were re- 
solved to fight. And they fought heroically and well, 
but under handicaps the like of which a nation had never 
before been forced to face. The Czar was a weakling 
surrounded by traitors; the Czarina was a German by 
birth and instincts, and in every possible way she in- 
trigued with the foe against her own people. We read 
of private wires leading from the palace at Tsarskoe 
Selo direct to German headquarters, over which went 
constantly news of troop movements and military plans ; 
and to a friend in Berlin the Czarina wrote, "Give my 
best greetings to the brave Hindenburg ; it is horrid to 
be compelled to sustain an anti-German attitude when 
one knows that our Fatherland is unconquerable, even 
hough the Russian flag be bathed in blood." The will 
of the unspeakable Rasputin was law at the court, and 
Rasputin was an agent of the Hun. In the highest posts 
of the government sat men like Boris Stunner, the 
Prime Minister, Kurloff, the Minister of the Interior, 
and the notorious Protopopoff, all paid tools of Ger- 
many, and the government deliberately planned confu- 
sion in the army, revolution at home, and victory for the 
foe. So completely was the situation given over to Ger- 
many that she could and did actually demand that a suc- 
cessful offensive be stopped and all communication be- 
tween Russia and her allies be broken off. In this sit- 
uation, what remained for a patriotic people but revolt ? 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 215 

They turned on a traitorous government, drove it from 
power, destroyed the autocracy, and endeavored to place 
in its stead a government of the people. 

To he sure they found themselves at sea. The transi- 
tion from the most absolute kind of autocracy to a free 
government could not be made in a day, in the midst 
of a great war, and by a people wholly ignorant of the 
principles of government. Ground down and oppressed 
as they had been for time out of mind, they craved lib- 
erty unrestrained, and in their ignorance they were ripe 
for socialistic schemes of the most radical sort. The 
pendulum swung too far and they found themselves in 
the clutches of Bolshevism. But the Bolsheviks do not 
represent Russia. They are Jews, crazed and maddened 
by untold persecution, and they are out for blood and 
vengeance; Russia can never struggle to her feet until 
the heel of the Red is lifted from her neck. But fools 
cannot always rule such a people. Sooner or later Rus- 
sia, perhaps reduced in territory and surely chastened 
in spirit by her terrible excesses, must take her place 
among the nations. 

To-day Russia needs everything which a people ever 
need. An orderly government must be set up. Tbod 
must be given to her millions. We must send her im- 
plements and teach her to use them in the develop- 
ment of her wonderful resources. The people should be 
supported and guided back to the ways of decency and 
placed upon a firm basis of democracy. Above all, she 
needs to be educated. Her people are ignorant, and 
hence a prey to all the vices of which ignorance is the 



216 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

prolific source. She needs the Protestant religion, and 
without it she will never be wholly free. The only 
religion Russia knows encourages the very ignorance 
which has cursed her and imposes an ecclesiastical tyr- 
anny quite as severe as the political autocracy from 
which she has escaped ; only western Protestantism will 
establish the schools which she needs, and in order to 
complete her salvation it will be necessary for the 
liberal and powerful ideas of the Protestant faith to 
permeate her life and leaven her society. Perhaps it is 
not the province of the Church to send food and imple- 
ments to Russia, but it is surely her province to send re- 
ligion and education, hospitals and benevolent institu- 
tions. And nowhere else in all the wide world is there 
such a crying need for these as in Russia. 

The very character of these people makes Russia an 
inviting mission field for the Church. It is a mistake 
to judge them by the acts of a Bolshevik. The Russian 
is religious by nature, and no person lives so constantly 
under the influence of spiritual ideals and motives. 
!None has such a clear realization of the presence and 
demands of God, none has a higher appreciation of 
spiritual values. The very career of Rasputin is proof 
of the desires of the people to touch spiritual reality — 
and not only the poor and ignorant ; because of this in- 
herent instinct the mock monk was able to seduce some 
of the noblest people of the nation. The genius of the 
Russian is remarkably like that of the old Hebrew, who 
saw God in rainbows, storms, victories, adversities, trees, 
and mists upon a mountain top. Prom such a people 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 217 

sprang our religion; from another such will come the 
spirit which will fill it with new meaning and power. 

One who wanders about over Europe to-day will meet 
hundreds of Russian refugees, and he cannot fail to he 
impressed with their idealism and innate spiritual cul- 
ture. They are the greatest linguists of the world, and 
they have a wonderful appreciation and knowledge of 
literature and music. There is in London to-day a 
refugee who has been driven through five nations; her 
jewels, her wealth, her family, have been lost, but she 
still retains some volumes of poems in beautiful bindings 
of hand-tooled leather. There is another who is deeply 
pained at the sight of great mansions, because they are 
too large for the families occupying them and their very 
presence brings up thoughts of the east end, where 
thousands huddle together in apartments too small for 
comfort. There was another who preferred suicide to 
the prospect of living until the close of the war in a 
disagreeable environment, and her philosophy was this : 
"To die means physical suffering and does not affect the 
soul, while an oppressed spirit means unhappiness and 
the dwarfing of personality. A Russian believes that 
the soul is worth more than the body. The American 
professes to believe that also, but a Russian believes it 
strongly enough to act upon it." 

That these people are superstitious, socialistic, and 
ultra-idealistic is quite true, but they need only the guid- 
ance of a liberal and intelligent faith, and the stabiliz- 
ing influence of a Church with a social message. A 
Protestant Russia is a large ambition, but on such un- 



218 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

dertakings the Church has always thrived. The con- 
summation is necessary to Russia's future, for if the 
spiritual genius of this people must continue to be dom- 
inated by either Greek or Roman Catholicism it will 
mean further superstition, ignorance, and oppression; 
to attempt such a continuance will stifle the new dem- 
ocracy which is trying to find establishment in the con- 
ceptions of the people. And this they will not easily 
tolerate. Eventually they will come to understand the 
conflict between their religion and their national con- 
sciousness — they are coming now to understand it — and 
then their religion will suffer. If there is no other faith 
to supplant it in their affections they will be likely to 
believe that the Bolsheviks were right, and religion will 
be thrown overboard entirely — and we know what that 
will mean. 

What shall be said of the other branches of the 
Slavic tree? In a window on Regent street and Picca- 
dilly Circus there is a streaming banner which reads, 
"Bohemia, Britain's Ally," and underneath it is a great 
picture of John Huss, the protomartyr of the Reforma- 
tion ; it is a typical indication of the spirit of the Czechs. 
Even though an almost total ignorance of this people 
prevailed among the masses in America, they were rec- 
ognized as a co-belligerent nation with the Allies and 
the United States ; and although they had no home and 
no national capital, the mere enunciation of their desires 
was sufficient to change the entire attitude of the Allies, 
as expressed by President Wilson, towards Austria- 
Hungary. Peace conditions which were laid down be- 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 219 

fore the emergence of the Czecho-Slavs and the Jugo- 
slavs at once became obsolete when these people pro- 
claimed their ambitions for freedom. 

And now we hear of them everywhere. Their voice 
shook the fragile foundations of the House of Haps- 
burg until it tottered and fell; that voice tore asunder 
the Dual Monarchy and liberated the suppressed senti- 
ments of the varied nationalities contained in that poly- 
glot empire. Czecho-Slavs and Jugo-Slovaks, Magyars 
and Teutons, all seek self-determination, and it seems 
likely that as many nations as there are constituent 
races will emerge from the old empire of Franz Joseph. 

The land of Czechs is the geographical center of 
Europe, an equal distance from all European seas, and 
these people have the lowest proportion of illiteracy of 
all the provinces in the constituency of Austria-Hun- 
gary. They have inhabited this section since the sixth 
century according to historical certainty, and the schol- 
ars believe they have occupied it since about 500 B. C. 
These people have been Christians since 873 A. D., 
and they would have been Christians before had not 
their distrust of the German impelled them to wait 
until the Moravians came to teach them. They have 
been Protestants longer than any other people of Europe, 
and they have suffered more for their faith in Protes- 
tantism than any other. They produced John Huss and 
bore the agony of the Hussite Wars ; the Catholics made 
war on them because their Nobles declared, "We will 
defend the law of our Lord Jesus Christ and its pious, 
humble, and steadfast preachers at the cost of our blood, 



220 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

scorning all Human decrees that may be contrary to 
them." 

The Czechs lost their independence and came under 
the hoof of Austria at the Battle of "Bila Hora" (White 
Hill) on November 8, 1620, and since that time they 
have been victims of oppression and intolerance. The 
first act of Austria was to destroy all the books printed 
in the language of the Czechs, because all such con- 
tained heresy; the next was to execute, on June 21, 
1621, all their leaders and confiscate the property of 
their sympathizers. All the Nobility were exiled, 
Protestants were expelled, Catholicism was set up, the 
clerical estate was added to the three estates then exist- 
ent and made superior to all others, and the German 
language was established by force. Thus matters have 
stood for four hundred years. In all their vicissi- 
tudes during these centuries the Czechs have always been 
victims of an insidious and powerful German propa- 
ganda, but they have never faltered in their contentions 
for constitutionality, as opposed to autocracy, in the 
Austrian parliament. 

No persons have done more to secure an open Bible in 
the vernacular of the people than the Czechs. In the 
fourteenth century, Thomas of Stitney wrote his theo- 
logical works in the native language, and for this he 
aroused the bitterness of the monks, who insisted on 
the use of Latin, unreadable by the people. Around 
their language has been waged the fiercest of conflicts. 
Always the Catholics have hated it ; always the Czechs 
have clung to it. In all the movements and spirits of 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 221 

the Reformation these devoted peoples have been the 
leaders, and to them the Protestant forces of the world 
owe a great obligation. 

For 400 years the Czechs have been the victims of 
religions bigotry and political oppression, for of course 
Austria would not be kind to the descendants and fol- 
lowers of John Huss, whose spirit still breathes through 
this people and is the source of their inspiration. The 
famous fifth regiment of the Czech army bears his name, 
and an American traveler who recently visited the lead- 
ers of this army in Siberia found on the wall of a freight 
car in a troop train a wonderful painting of Huss at 
the stake, executed by a private of the fifth regiment who 
had formerly been a famous artist in Vienna. This is 
the spirit of those men who have at last secured their 
freedom. And when they secured it they hoisted no red 
flag, espoused no Bolshevism, turned loose no anarchy. 
Although a scattered people, without a land of their 
own or any seat of government, they elected a Presi- 
dent and proceeded to organize for an orderly and civil- 
ized existence. 

The settlement of these people into a national exist- 
ence will afford an unique opportunity to the American 
Church. They have a claim upon us, for they fur- 
nished the cradle of Protestantism, and their loyalty 
to Huss shows the strength of their religious convic- 
tions. Already they have drawn upon our resources, 
for many of the American missionaries in China, Japan, 
and Korea have been called from their fields into service 
with the Czechs in Siberia, and certain hospitals have 



222 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

sent their entire staffs and senior classes to undertake 
relief work among the soldiers and refugees in Vladivos- 
tok. These missionaries, according to their report, 
"found such conditions as would stir any man with red 
blood in his veins. Through the perfidy of the Bolshevik 
Soviets, urged on by the Germans, and the continuous 
fighting all across Europe and Siberia, the Czechs were, 
through lack of medical attention, in a most pitiable con- 
dition. It seemed necessary to undertake responsibility 
for entirely supplying the medical arm of the Czech 
army." In addition to the need of the Czechs, hun- 
dreds of thousands of refugees have fled through Si- 
beria to the Pacific and clamor to the missionaries for 
help. 

The Slavic people, then, constitute an inviting mis- 
sionary field for Protestantism, and the help which the 
missionaries already are rendering to them in Vladivos- 
tok and Siberia is preparing the field for a more in- 
tensive cultivation. The Church should undertake the 
task, not only for the sake of the peoples themselves 
but even for her own salvation. We of the west have 
become commercialized and self -centered ; there are al- 
ready evidences that the war has not cured us. Even 
the soldiers of Prance seem sorry for the Americans, 
because they say we cannot rise above our interest in 
mere things. We need to be saved from our worship 
of the physical, and the Church shares this need with 
all other departments of our activity. The best way 
to save ourselves is to kindle elsewhere a different spirit. 
The Slavs have it. If we will give the idealism of the 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 223 

Russians and kindred peoples free play under the in- 
fluence of a liberal faith, we may expect to see come 
from them a wave of spiritual appreciation which will 
sweep the world. 

If we add to the challenge which is thus brought to 
the Church by the new problems created through the 
war the tremendous missionary demands which were al- 
ready existent before the war in China, Japan, Korea, 
Africa, India, South America, and elsewhere, demands 
which have been made a hundred-fold more urgent by 
the events of the past years, we will obtain a glimpse 
of the duty of the American Church toward the foreign 
field, for whatever missionary work is undertaken in 
the world at the present time must be carried out largely 
by American organizations. And then if we add to all 
that the challenge of the home land — our cities, industri- 
al populations, immigrants, rural communities, negroes, 
and all the social problems entailed by their needs — we 
should be able to understand that the Church never 
faced such a task as that which lies before her at the 
present time. 

Before this challenge she must not draw back in such 
a time as this, and if it be undertaken the Church must 
plan and act on a scale so large that it would have stag- 
gered the men of the past generation. Where we once 
expended hundreds we must now pour out millions, and 
divisions, petty insistence upon trivialities, the ambi- 
tions of ecclesiastical leaders and organizations must all 
be laid aside and forgotten. There is no other way out 
for us ; the task must be undertaken or the Church will 



SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

lose her influence in the life of our time. The Chris- 
tian leader, or the ordinary Christian man, who balks at 
the program, or who refuses to cast his attitude and his 
liberality on such a scale, is the real enemy of the 
faith and must have no place among us. 

Once the duty of a Christian man seemed to be 
summed up in the necessity of "being good" — the re- 
ligious man was one who behaved himself, went to 
Church, and prayed. But in four years the ideal has 
been forced infinitely beyond that. To the world, and 
especially to the millions of men under arms and who 
will return to dominate affairs in all nations, religion 
now means unselfish devotion, loving service, complete 
sacrifice of self and possessions in doing good. 

Who is the religious person in the minds of the sol- 
diers? The Salvation Army lassie or her kind. The 
religious man is one who is willing to brave the dan- 
gers of a modern war in order to scrub floors and do 
drudgery for his fellow man. He is one who is willing 
to toil over shell-swept roads, to sleep on the ground in a 
front line trench, to clamber over a parapet to be with 
his friends in death and danger — to bare his breast to 
death and place his naked human spirit against the 
guns of a whole world in order to be a friend to man. 
He is a man who places no value upon himself or any 
thing he may possess, who counts his life as of less 
value than a chance to be a brother. He is one who 
gives all and risks all just to "help a little in his own 
way. That is what a religious man means to a soldier 
who has seen such men in the mud of the front line, 



THE CHALLENGE TO THE CHURCH 225 

in a gun emplacement deep in the earth, carrying 
stretchers or supplies across a field of death, kneeling 
on the blood-soaked ground with his canteen to the 
lips of a dying friend. And to them a religious insti- 
tution means something which can inspire the motives 
under which such men act, and which will pour out its 
millions to supply the means whereby such men can 
render their full quota of service. 

How puny will religious men and institutions of the 
average type appear when these return and look at 
them ! How small visioned will appear the Church with 
its old program of preaching and paying assessments! 
"We need not expect men who have saved a world in 
the mightiest movement of human history to be content 
with an average Christian, an average religion, or an 
average Church. The day of such averages as we have 
known is forever in the past, 



CHAPTER X 

THE GERMANS AND THE TURKS 

It appeared somewhat incongruous in the beginning 
that there should be an alliance between the Germans 
and the Turks, for a surface view of things inclined us 
to believe that the two races were absolutely incom- 
patible. The Turk is known through history and 
around the world as the "Unspeakable." He is the 
bloodiest, most cruel, and most villainous pagan on 
earth; his instrument of propaganda is the sword and 
his most characteristic act of worship is the spilling 
of human blood. He hates Christianity with a deadly 
hatred, and in all the ages of his occupancy in Europe 
or in Asia his misrule and his outbreaking criminality 
against Christ and His followers have been a standing 
source of amazement to the civilized world. 

On the other hand the German has boasted around 
the world about his standing in the sight of God. The 
German Church bolstered up the doctrine of the di- 
vine right of the Hohenzollerns. The Germans have 
assumed that they are the chosen of God and enjoy a 
monopoly of His favor. "Germany is precisely — who 
would deny it," preaches Pastor H. Francke, "the rep- 
resentative of the highest morality, of the purest hu- 

226 



THE GERMANS AND THE TURKS <W 

inanity, of the most chastened Christianity. Its defeat, 
its decline, would mean a falling back to the worst bar- 
barism." Pastor W. Lehman remarks that "Germany's 
fight against the whole world is in reality the battle of 
the spirit against the whole world's infamy, falsehood, 
and devilish cunning." It is the doctrine of E. Philippi 
that "we execute God's almighty will, and the edicts of 
His justice we will fulfill, imbued with holy rage, in 
vengeance upon the ungodly. God calls us to murderous 
battles, even if worlds should thereby fall in ruins. We 
are woven together like the chastening lash of war ; we 
flame aloft like lightning! like gardens of roses our 
wounds blossom at the gates of Heaven." "Is God the 
God of these others?" asks a noted preacher, with ref- 
erence to the enemies of Germany; and this is his 
answer: "No; they serve at best Satan, the father of 
lies." Another insists that "the German soul is the 
world's soul, God and Germany belong to one another." 
This is the way Pastor J. Rump, in his "War Devo- 
tions," looks at it: "The kingdom of God must now 
assert itself against the kingdom of all that is base, evil 
and vile : the kingdom of light against the kingdom of 
darkness. Against a world of superhuman evil, the 
power of superhuman justice, truth, and love goes out 
to battle. We stand on the side of God, but all God's 
adversaries will find that God will not be mocked. We 
have become the heirs of Israel, the people of the Old 
Testament covenant. We shall be the bearers of God's 
promises. Verily the Bible is our book. It was given 
and assigned to us." "As was Israel among the heathen, 



228 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

so is Germany among the modern nations — the pious 
heart of Europe," says Pastor Tolzien in "My German 
Fatherland." The Kaiser speaks of "Me and God" 
with pious unction, always placing, in speech and atti- 
tude, the "me" before the "God." 

These quotations, which could easily he multiplied 
a hundred times, establish the point: The German re- 
gards himself as the elect of God, the center of God's 
plan, the embodiment of His kingdom, the possessor of 
His favor. Of course, they show another thing to us, 
viz., that the Germans under the dominion of such be- 
liefs are a nation of swell-headed and sacrilegious fools 
who ought to be exterminated for the general good of 
civilization. But for our present purpose it is enough 
to draw the conclusion that they are ultra-pious and 
assume an air of superiority in all the elements of the 
Christian faith. 

This was the people who, at the beginning of the 
war, raised a great hue and cry because Japan hap- 
pened to be an ally of England. "England stirs up 
against us the yellow Jap" went thrilling around the 
world, and the manifesto signed by the leading lights 
of German scholarship depicted the backset which the 
Christian missionary enterprise would suffer because 
of this alliance. But in a few more months Germany 
entered into an alliance with the Unspeakable Turk. 
Instantly the devotion of the German scholarship to the 
welfare of Christian missions waned. The emperor, 
ranking member of the "Me and God" combination, 
paraded and smirked in the uniform of a Turkish gen- 



THE GERMANS AND THE TURKS 229 

eral, and a general seance of connubiation was entered 
upon. 

It was a strange alliance to the rest of the world, 
but the Germans saw no inconsistency in it at all. 
So far as the German scholars, self-appointed protectors 
of Christian missions, were concerned, it was a perfectly 
logical combination. The Turk is not nearly so vile as 
the Jap ! They forgot instantly that before Turkey en- 
tered the war Pastor Tolzien had vehemently denounced 
Germany's opponents because certain Mohammedans 
were serving in their armies. And, in order to satisfy 
the consciences of people who might be struck by the 
contradiction of the German-Turkish alliance, the schol- 
ars set about the task of explaining the matter. The 
duty fell to the lot of Professor W. Hermann, professor 
of theology at Marburg, who settled the question in his 
pamphlet, "The Turks, the English, and We German 
Christians." 

The ancient hatred between Turks and Christians, 
he believes, rests upon a great misunderstanding. 
"It is true that the Mohammedans do not know 
the Old or the New Testament, and Mohammed 
did not respect Jesus. Yet they are in some respects 
superior to us. It is a stupendous feat that this re- 
ligion should in so short a time have spread from India 
to Granada. Another point is that the Turks have been 
unified by their religion, the Germans have not. The 
main thing, however, is this, that the faith of the Turks 
assures them that God ordains everything, and is the 
reality in everything. The word Islam means exactly 



230 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

the same as the Biblical word faith: that is, complete 
self -surrender. As Goethe said, when this became clear 
to him : 'Then we are all of us, in reality, believers in 
Islam!' But Mohammed also maintains that we are 
free and responsible for what we do, wherefore God will 
judge us all ; and in this too we agree with him. On no 
account must one suppose that the Mohammedan belief 
in God is only a belief in an inflexible fate. No ; it is 
also a belief in God's wisdom and goodness. There is 
certainly this difference, that only by looking to Jesus 
can we Christians find courage to hold such a faith. 
Nevertheless we must maintain that we stand near to 
the Turks in our faith — only they have not recognized 
the right foundation of the faith they hold. But we 
Germans can help them to that. . . . We Germans can 
obey, so can the Turks. Just because we believe in un- 
conditional obedience, we Germans feel ourselves at one 
with the Turk, and divided from the English. See how 
barren the spiritual life of England has become! 
Amongst its statesmen there are, indeed, artful, cool men 
of business, and reckless men of violence, down to the 
criminal type, but not a single deeply pious man, ca- 
pable of appealing to the hidden springs within his peo- 
ple. This is the reason why the mastery of England 
was felt as a nightmare by the world. But now that 
Germans and Turks are To have their way, things will 
be different. . . . The German nation is certainly at 
the present time the instrument of the spirit ; but it is 
on the spirit itself that all depends, the right fear of 
God, the will to serve, faithfulness to one's mission. 



THE GERMANS AND THE TURKS 231 

And this spirit we find also in the Turks. It is this 
which, in the last analysis, unites us." (Bang: "Hur- 
rah and Hallelujah/' 170-173.) 

So this settles it. The Turks and Germans are not so 
radically different after all. This is a truth which I 
have long suspected, and it has recently ripened to a 
deep conviction, and I am glad to find that the Hun's 
own scholarship confirms my view of the case. 

The Germans, then, have a clear conscience, and once 
the conscience is clear their spirits can respond freely 
to the natural elements of character which draw them 
together — German and Turk. So the Kaiser proclaimed 
a holy war on behalf of the Turks, and while Islam 
murdered, starved, butchered, drowned the Armenian 
Christians, Kultur stalked through Belgium and France, 
outraging women and children, sinking neutral ships, 
bombing hospitals, deporting citizens of the devastated 
regions, forcing women to dig their trenches, and com- 
mitting depredations which have horrified the civilized 
world. Naturally, "we Germans feel ourselves at one 
with the Turk, and divided from England." 

Traveling in France recently, I secured some of the 
circulars posted by the German commanders in the 
various towns and villages which they overran in France 
and Belgium. A few extracts from these circulars will 
perhaps be illuminating: "To the Belgian People: 
It is to my very great regret that the German troops 
find themselves compelled to cross the Belgian frontier. 
They are acting under the constraint of an unavoidable 
necessity, Belgium's neutrality having been violated by 



SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

French officers who, in disguise, crossed Belgian terri- 
tory by motor-car in order to make their way into Ger- 
many. ... I give formal pledges to the Belgian popu- 
lation that it will have nothing to suffer from the hor- 
rors of war, that we will pay in gold for the provisions 
that must be taken from the country, and that our sol- 
diers will prove themselves the best of friends to a 
people for whom we feel the highest esteem. Von 
Emmich." "Notice. All the inhabitants of the house, 
with the exception of children under 14, and their moth- 
ers, and also of old people, must prepare themselves for 
deportation in an hour-and-a-half's time. All appeals 
will be useless. Any one attempting to evade depor- 
tation will be punished without mercy. Etappen Kom- 
mandantur." "Proclamation. The Tribunal of the 
Imperial German Council of War sitting in Brussels 
has pronounced the following sentences: Condemned 
to death: Edith Cavell, Teacher, of Brussels. The 
sentence passed on Edith Cavell has already been fully 
executed. The Governor-General of Brussels brings 
these facts to the knowledge of the public that they may 
serve as a warning. The Governor of the City, General 
Von Bissing." "Proclamation. In future the inhabi- 
tants of places situated near railways and telegraph lines 
which have been destroyed will be punished without 
mercy (whether they are guilty of this destruction or 
not) . For this purpose, hostages have been taken in all 
places in the vicinity of railways in danger of similar 
attacks ; and at the first attempt to destroy any railway, 
telegraph, or telephone line, they will be shot imme- 



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THE GERMANS AND THE TURKS 233 

diately. The Governor. Von der Goltz." "Notice to 
the Population. In order sufficiently to ensure the 
safety of our troops and the tranquillity of the popula- 
tion of Reims, the persons mentioned have been seized 
as hostages by the Commander of the German Army. 
These hostages will be shot if there is the least disorder. 
On the other hand, if the town remains perfectly calm 
and quiet, these hostages will be placed under the pro- 
tection of the German Army. The General Command- 
ing." "Proclamation. Inhabitants of both sexes are 
strictly forbidden to leave their houses so far as this is 
not absolutely necessary for making short rounds, to 
buy provisions or water the cattle. They are absolutely 
forbidden to leave their houses at night under any cir- 
cumstances whatever. Whoever attempts to leave the 
place, by day or night, upon any pretext, whatever, will 
be shot. Potatoes can only be dug with the comman- 
dant's consent and under military supervision. The Ger- 
man troops have orders to carry out these directions 
strictly, by sentinels and patrols, who are authorized 
to fire on any one departing from these directions. The 
General Commanding." "Order. To the People of 
Liege. The population of Andenne, after making a 
display of peaceful intentions towards our troops, at- 
tacked them in the most treacherous manner. With my 
authorization, the General commanding these troops has 
reduced the town to ashes and has had 110 persons 
shot. I bring this fact to the knowledge of the people 
of Liege in order that they may know what fate to ex- 



234 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

pect should they adopt a similar attitude. General Von 
Billow." 

Comment on such proclamations as these is unneces- 
sary. They throw an interesting light on the German 
declaration that "amongst English statesmen there is 
not a single deeply pious man, capable of appealing to 
the hidden springs within his people. Now that Ger- 
mans and Turks have their way, things will be different. 
The German nation is certainly at the present moment 
the instrument of the spirit." 

With these things before us, we would naturally ex- 
pect Germans to be wrathful when Jerusalem, the holy 
city of Christianity, was wrested from the vile Turk. 
At this event a thrill of joy ran around the world; it 
became the subject of optimism everywhere. The 
Pope has forbidden any Christian to lift his hand 
in an attempt to restore the holy city to the Turk, and 
faithful Jews are happy and hopeful in many lands. 
All Christians are happy save the Germans, the self- 
acclaimed Superchristians. Professor Delbriick has al- 
ready proclaimed that the city of the Cross must again 
be restored to the Turk, and an appeal has been issued to 
the Zionist Jews to rally to the cause of the German 
and Turk to help them raise the crescent over the 
ancient city of David again. This appeal to the Zionists 
is perhaps the most ridiculous manifesto which the Ger- 
mans have put out during the war. 

Closely allied to this is the action of Dr. Adolf Deiss- 
man, professor of theology in Berlin, in abjectly plead- 
ing with some of the Christian scholars of Europe to 



THE GERMANS AND THE TURKS 235 

use their influence in securing a modification of the 
terms of the armistice imposed upon Germany, after 
having, at the beginning of the war, given expression to 
such sentiments as the following: "The German God 
is not only the theme of some of our poets and prophets, 
but also a historian like Max Lenz has, with fiery tongue 
and in deep thankfulness, borne witness to the revela- 
tion of the German God in our holy war. The German, 
the National, God ! . . . Has war in this case impaired, 
or has it steeled religion ? I say it has steeled it. . . . 
This is no relapse to a lower level, but a mounting up to 
God Himself." "It is a persistent struggle for posses- 
sions, power and sovereignty that primarily governs the 
relations of one nation to another, and right is respected 
so far only as it is compatible with advantage." "In 
the age of the most tremendous mobilization of physical 
and spiritual forces the world has ever seen, we proclaim 
— no, we do not proclaim it, but it reveals itself — the 
Religion of Strength." 

The religious genius of the German peoples peculiarly 
fitted itself into the facts of this war and lent itself 
readily to the methods with which the war was waged. 
The religious life of the German Empire in the past 
few years has been rather sharply divided into two 
classes. First, there is the political Prussian state 
Church, the most dismal orthodoxy on earth. It preaches 
a thirteenth-century gospel and stands for a medieval 
theology. It is this orthodoxy which has bolstered the 
Emperor in his declaration of "divine right," and which 
caused him as late as 1903 to intervene in a theological 



236 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

discussion, in the course of which intervention he de- 
clared that his own grandfather had been the chosen 
of God. Under the benign influence of a state Church, 
the German Empire has the distinction of being the 
only nation of Christendom to adhere to the very last to 
the outgrown notion of the divine right of kings. This 
German orthodoxy retains the old Hebrew Jehovah as 
its God, a God of battles who has chosen Prussia from 
among the nations and assured to the Germans a mon- 
opoly of his favor. The preachers have referred to him 
as "dwelling above the cherubim and seraphim and the 
Zeppelins !" 

Edmond von Heyking, once a German consul in New 
York, referred to God as "our great Ally, who stands 
behind the German battalions, behind our ships and sub- 
marines, and behind our blessed militarism." Pastor 
W. Lehmann speaks of the German "defending God 
against the world," to the end that "the German soul," 
which is "God's soul," "shall and will rule over the 
world." Pastor Eump of Berlin issued a volume of 
"War Devotions," through the pages of which he fed the 
soldiers on such a wholesome diet as this: "We shall 
permeate, in the name of God, a world which has be- 
come poor and desolate." "We have become the heirs 
of Israel, the people of the Old Testament covenant. 
We shall be the bearers of God's promises." "The Bible 
is our book. It was given and assigned to us, and we 
read in it the original text of our destiny, which pro- 
claims to mankind salvation or disaster according as we 
will it." Pastor Tolzien believes that Germany is, "as 



THE GERMANS AND THE TURKS 237 

was Israel among the nations, the pious heart of 
Europe." Dr. Preuss, Licentiate of Theology, preached 
that "the thief who expiated a sinful past by his repent- 
ance in the last hour, and was outwardly subjected to the 
same suffering as our Lord, is the type of the Turkish 
nation, which now puts Christianity (outside Germany) 
to shame." This is German orthodoxy. 

On the other side of her religious life, Germany has 
the most advanced and reckless liberalism of the world ; 
her rationalism in theology is as severe as her orthodoxy. 
Any person who is at all familiar with the theories of 
German scholars with advanced theological ideas can 
tell the opinions of such scholars on any question in the 
domain of their science without having reference to 
their works, because these scholars invariably go to the 
last extremes of rationalism. They have declared most 
of the scripture writings to be unauthentic, they have 
banished miracles entirely, and they have reduced to 
the vanishing point the divine element in the nature of 
Christ. And these are not the so-called "free thinkers" ; 
they are the leaders of German theological thought. 

So far, this is not an unusual situation, since we have 
both extremes here in America. We have rationalists as 
"advanced" as any German. And we also have a group 
of literalists whose mechanical views issue in pre-mil- 
lenarianism, an orthodoxy as dismal and ancient as any- 
thing boasted by Germany. But neither of these ex- 
tremes exerts any appreciable influence in the religious 
life of America. The difference is that we have a mid- 
dle ground, while Germany has not. She knows noth- 



238 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

ing of such an influence as that of our great Protestant 
denominations, which take account of changing condi- 
tions and incorporate all the ideas and discoveries of 
advancing knowledge without going to the absurd and 
unwarranted extremes of infidelity. Such an influence 
is so utterly unknown in Germany that the greatest 
scholar and philosopher of the land, Rudolf Eucken, 
when he discovered that the Church and a religious life 
are necessities and that neither Germany's orthodoxy 
nor her rationalism could contain the religious aspira- 
tions of the race, jumped to the conclusion that the 
whole organization of the Church must he overthrown. 
He had no conception of a progressive mean being al- 
ready in existence, because his horizon was bounded by 
the confines of the German Empire. 

]STow what did that situation mean ? It gave us the 
great war ; orthodoxy as well as rationalism is to blame 
for it. Both contributed to making the people lose God ; 
the one gave them a false conception of His nature and 
the other caused them to lose His morality and His vital 
influence as dynamic powers in human life. Both, 
from opposite standpoints, gave the people an external 
God," and so both were ready for the war : the orthodox 
because God willed it, the rationalist because there is no 
moral God to care. The one made the state the supreme 
end of God's purpose, as the Israelites did; the other 
placed the aims of the state above God's moral pur- 
poses. And when this had been done religious Ger- 
many was ready for the war, or for anything else. So 
when Belgium was invaded both could march side by 



THE GERMANS AND THE TURKS 239 

side, the one believing that the German God willed it 
even as the Israelitish God ordered the extermination of 
the Canaanites, and the other not having any relation- 
ship with God which enabled them to know that God 
took any interest in the matter. In both cases the state 
was supreme and common morality might be cast to the 
winds. 

And so I believe that the religious issues of the war 
will be the destruction of both orthodoxy and rational- 
ism. ITever again will men be able to commit crimes in 
the name of God. The passing of the greatest of all 
earthly calamities must leave the world politically and 
religiously better. Democracy and freedom will pre- 
vail throughout the world and autocracy can never re- 
turn, while the superficial clamors of those who are for- 
ever seeing the world going to hell and Christ return- 
ing will be silenced. Out of the changing order there 
seems destined to issue a more vital religious faith than 
anything we have ever known before. 



CHAPTER XI 

AMONG THE TOILEES 

The person who visits Europe with his eyes open 
in these days will soon understand that the people are 
being horn. Democracy is in the air and the common- 
ality is coming into a standing which it never before 
possessed, for the world realizes that the ultimate man 
is the toiler and is according to him a new respect. 
To-day in Europe the laborer has a greater respect, 
more money, and more influence than he ever had before. 
One morning I chanced to glance through the "want 
ads" of a daily paper and the notice that caught and 
held my attention was this: "Wanted, a piano and a 
high-grade player by a lady munition worker with the 
ready money." A day later I saw this advertisement 
reproduced by another paper under the heading : "The 
Modern Plutocracy." And I chanced to overhear a con- 
versation in a tea room between two elderly ladies in 
which one of them complained that these munition 
workers had purchased all the good pianos so that it 
was impossible for "the better element" to obtain one. 
Previously I had waited over an hour in a shoe store 
before I could make a purchase, and at last the shoes 
I bought were fitted to my feet by a young lady; the 



AMONG THE TOILERS 241 

manager explained that the government had taken ten 
of his twelve salesmen and it was practically impos- 
sible to accommodate the customers. Everywhere could 
be seen posters begging for men and women to accept 
positions of various kinds, and it was easy to under- 
stand that no person need be idle if he Jiad the least in- 
clination to work. He could be employed for twenty- 
four hours each day and seven days in the week if such 
were physically possible, and at wages higher than he 
could have obtained anywhere before the war. 

Thus I became intensely interested in the life of 
the workers in the warring countries and set out upon 
the quest for fuller information concerning them. I 
found that there was no problem of the unemployed 
for the simple reason that there was no such class to 
create a problem, except as it might have been made up 
of a few who would not work under any circumstances. 
Of course there was a scarcity of workers ; it could not 
have been otherwise with such an army in the field. 
And this scarcity, together with the great increase in 
munition works and allied industries taken over by the 
government, had set in motion the competitive machin- 
ery which had boosted wages to such a point. The work- 
ers were no more dominated by the altruistic and patri- 
otic spirit in war times than they had been in the days 
of peace; they were out for the cash and did not hesi- 
tate to take advantage of the severe situation in order 
to better their own condition, being spurred on in this 
by their unions and the agitators. 

I welcomed gladly an invitation from the govern- 



SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

ment to pay visits to the various munition factories. 
Up at Gretna there were twenty thousand young women 
making great shells, at Woolwich still more were work- 
ing in the arsenal plant turning out the great field 
guns, and at Enfield I watched them making the famous 
Enfield rifle and rebuilding German machine guns to be 
sent back and turned against the former owners. The 
commandant in charge of one of these plants told me 
that a certain group of workers, which he designated, 
who were by no means the most highly paid in the fac- 
tory, earned by piece work more than $40.00 per week 
and that most of the women were making three times 
as much as they had ever made before. These amounts 
seem very large to the English workers and they are 
happy, even if they are not contented ; it would be dif- 
ficult to make them contented, which is perhaps a good 
thing for society all around. 

I observed that the conditions under which the peo- 
ple live have been appreciably improved, although their 
machines did not seem to be well equipped with 
safety appliances. The cleanliness of the plants and 
the perfect order which prevailed were particularly no- 
ticeable. There were few hotels maintained in the 
munition centers, and I found the commandants 
more or less opposed to their establishment, but; 
the dining rooms are all very clean and the food 
is wholesome and cheap. I was at Enfield at the 
noon hour. The workers eat in shifts of 5,000 each, 
the men dining separately from the women, and at the 
sound of the whistle the first 5,000 came trooping out, 



AMONG THE TOILERS 243 

their coats on and their hands washed. I asked if they 
were allowed to "knock off" a few minutes early to 
perform their ablutions, and the commandant replied: 
"They are supposed to run their machines until the 
whistle sounds, but as a matter of fact they are like 
all other workers — they keep their eyes on the clock." 
Here I visited the savings bank, in charge of a clergy- 
man, and found that the energetic campaign he had 
introduced to educate the people in the matter of 
economy had been so successful that thousands were 
laying up a surplus. 

How were the poor being affected in their homes and« 
personal life by the war ? This question occurred to me 
so insistently that I resolved to make some excursions 
into the east end in order to investigate the social life 
in these conditions. I started from the neighborhood 
of the great Methodist community center on Commercial, 
Road. Under the escort of the social workers from thist 
mission I secured a knowledge of the neighborhood and 
was ready to begin my prowlings. 

First I was anxious to visit some of the public houses, 
the "poor men's clubs," as they are apologetically called 
even in England, in the evening when the gayety was at 
its height. Here I encountered difficulty, because the 
restrictions thrown about the traffic in liquor had caused 
a great reduction in the jollity of the east end; some of 
the "pubs" were forced to display a sign early in the 
afternoon informing their customers that the allotted 
supply of ale had been exhausted for the day. But I 
found a place which usually held back during the day- 



244 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

light hours that joy might be unconfined in the evening, 
and this establishment I resolved to visit. I strolled 
in early in the evening, about ten o'clock. It was filled 
with a motley crew, moving here and there in the dense 
clouds of tobacco smoke, standing at the bar, and sitting 
at the tables. There were a few sailors, one or two 
soldiers, a couple of men in civilian clothing, and per- 
haps twenty women; the women outnumbered the men 
more than two to one. It was the most revolting scene 
I had thus far encountered. The vile language of the 
sailors, almost equaled by that of the women, the thick- 
ness of the smoke, the stench of the atmosphere laden 
with ale-fumes, the familiarity of the bar-maids, and 
the general lowness of the environment was quite re- 
pulsive. At first I was the recipient of many suspicious 
glances in this "pub" and felt exceedingly uncomfort- 
able, but the knowledge of the friends who were escort- 
ing me and the expenditure of a few shillings on "drinks 
for the crowd" seemed to reassure those who at first re- 
sented the presence of a stranger in the camp. We fell 
into a jolly party over there in a corner — a soldier, a 
sailor, and three young women. These girls were fairly 
intelligent, and a short conversation served to dispel the 
impression that I had formed concerning them. They 
were not at all the class of womanhood I had expected 
them to be — the kind they would have been if they had 
been found in an American saloon. The three were 
wives of soldiers at the front and one of them had ac- 
cepted employment in a munition factory. They smoked 
cigarettes incessantly and drank their "stout" with the 



AMONG THE TOILERS 245 

confidence of confirmed topers, and they were filled with 
wonder that I should be there and yet refuse the taste 
of their ale. To them this public house was a social 
institution, and they frequented it with the same assur- 
ance that an American girl would visit an ice cream 
parlor. They were by no means immoral yet. 

"It seems to me that the government would prohibit 
the sale of intoxicants during the war," I ventured. 

They glanced up quickly and scrutinized my face. 
"Let 'em/' they exploded. "They've took our lads, an' 
they've took our bread, an' they've took our sugar, an' 
they've turned off the light. Now will they tike our 
ale?" 

"But, you know," I continued, "the lads cannot fight 
when they drink much ale, and its manufacture is the 
waste of grain that should be used in bread." 

But my logic was lost on the party. They were deeply 
resentful and insisted on keeping their ale whether the 
war was won or not. "We might as well 'ave the 'un 
as to 'ave no liberty left any'ow," was the conclusion 
of the whole matter. 

When the crowd dwindled somewhat and but two of 
the girls remained I asked them what they were doing 
at the "pub." One of them spoke for the other. "Ye 
see, sir, me man 'e's out there and 'as been out there 
these months and I've 'ad never a glimpse of 'im. Me 
heart was so lonesome and I was terrible afraid 'e 
wouldn't come back again. An' what did the govern- 
ment give me but a pittance? I had to find friends to 
keep me poor heart from breakin', an' so I comes down 



246 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

to the pub in the evenin' to be 'appy. If I stayed at 'ome 
I'd go ravin' mad with the fright and the worry." 

"Do you go out with the friends you make here some- 
times ?" I inquired warily. 

"Ye wouldn't blime me if we went to a show now and 
then, would ye? I don't mean no 'arm, and if me 
'usband knowed 'e wouldn't blime me neyther, 'cause 
when 'e left he told me to ? ave a good time and not be 
miserable." 

I went away from that public house deeply impressed. 
Indeed, I could not "blime" them if they sought a res- 
pite from the horror of a lonely room somewhere, and 
the "pub" was the only place where such a respite might 
be found. But what would it lead to ? I could picture 
to myself a thousand ruined girls and wrecked homes, 
and that many soldiers returning to blasted firesides — 
and all because of the public house. And under my 
breath I cursed England for a land without a conscience, 
selling the blood and hearts of her people to a group of 
brewers, some of whom wrote M. P. after their names 
and occupied places, directly or indirectly, in the gov- 
ernment itself. In time of war these "pubs" should 
have been the first to feel the righteous indignation of an 
outraged people and should have had meted out to them 
the death which they have deserved so long that the 
memory of man runneth not to the contrary. For the 
girls to whom I had spoken were not exceptions; they 
were representative of multiplied thousands whose ruin 
is being accomplished by the liquor traffic while "the 
'usband is out there." 



AMONG THE TOILERS 247 

Now I went to the "Mahogany Bar." It was once 
the most noted music house in the east end but has been 
turned into a social settlement. The concert hall is now 
an auditorium of the mission, seated with rough benches 
in lieu of the tables and chairs that once were used. But 
the trapdoors are still in the floor. These doors were 
immediately under the chairs at the tables in the good 
old days, and it was an easy matter to dump a drunken 
sailor into the cellar without overmuch confusion; once 
in the cellar and the formality of robbing him, even to 
the taking of the clothing that covered his body, had 
been completed the unfortunate was carried by under- 
ground passages to the street several blocks distant. 
When he awoke in the morning, if indeed he ever did 
awake, he knew nothing of the passage through which 
he had been carried, and since he was found far from 
the resort it was a difficult matter to fasten suspicion 
upon the place. The superintendent in charge of "the 
Bar" told me that even now, since the resort has been 
converted into a community kitchen, he frequently finds 
nude sailors lying in the alley close by, having been 
robbed during a spree the night before. 

Then I went to "Paddy's Goose." This was in for- 
mer days another noted music hall, and it has likewise 
been changed into a mission — it is a branch of the 
Stepney mission, like the Mahogany Bar. "The 
Goose" obtained its name in an interesting way. There 
is an immense metal swan mounted over the door on 
the roof, and it one day became the object of a heated 
discussion between a "bouncer" named Paddy and one 



248 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

of his compatriots; Paddy insisted that it was a goose 
and his friend was quite convinced that it was a swan. 
In the course of events Paddy was forced to vindicate 
his position by force of fists, and he did this to the 
entire satisfaction of the party of the second part. After 
that, no one dared to deny that the figure was that of a 
goose, and the resort retains the name of "Paddy's 
Goose" to this day. Here there are no trapdoors, but 
the patrons had the convenience of a draw-bridge which, 
when lowered, spanned a court between the "Goose" and 
some nearby buildings; in this way the friends of the 
establishment could escape in times of stress, and unfor- 
tunate sailors could be carried far from the scenes of 
their excesses. But the mighty have fallen ! Like the 
Mahogany Bar, Paddy's Goose is now a mission of the 
Methodist Church, and here is carried on a great round 
of war-time activities and benevolent service. The con- 
version of this place has been celebrated by George R. 
Sims ("Dagonet") as follows: 

I stand awhile to muse and glance, 
Where Jack of old would sing and dance. 
I pause and hear sweet sounds within 
The old-time haunt of shame and sin; 
And gentle voices softly raise 
To God their songs of prayer and praise. 
Good folks have turned to Christian use 
The devil's temple — "Paddy's Goose.' ' 

"In the days and nights when the drunken sailor of 
the world reeled along the highway from the dram- 
shops to the dancing-rooms, and from the dancing-rooms 



AMONG THE TOILERS 249 

to the back alleys and courts of Artichoke Hill, where 
they were always robbed and sometimes murdered, 
'Paddy's Goose' was accepted as a characteristic Brit- 
ish institution. And now the old 'White Swan,' which 
was 'Paddy's Goose/ is a meeting-house of the Wes- 
leyan East End Mission. The 'Old Mahogany Bar,' 
which was almost as notorious as the 'Goose,' has been 
converted — converted is a happy word — into a center of 
religious and social uplifting." 

"What is the social effect of the increased wages the 
working people are now receiving %" I asked the super- 
intendent of Stepney. 

"In many instances it is good," he replied. "Fre- 
quently the additional money is expended for better 
quarters, clothes, and food. Some of the people have 
moved out of the old neighborhood and are taking their 
places in a better social environment, while there is a 
marked improvement in the matter of amusement and 
recreation. But this exodus is from the ranks of the 
more steady element, and in nearly all cases it removes 
some of the workers at our missions. It is gradually 
leaving us without workers and members, but of course 
we are glad to struggle along in our poverty if our 
people can be improved." 

I called to my side a beautiful little girl whom I 
found in the mission. She had formerly lived near, 
but her parents had removed to other sections when the 
prosperous times came upon them, and now the little 
girl was visiting one of her friends among the social 
workers. "And how do you like your new home?" I 



250 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

asked her. "I don't like it one bit," she emphatically 
exclaimed, "and I wish I could come back down here. 
Why, I have not seen a fight since I left, and the Bobby 
comes down the street all by himself I" In the old en- 
vironment she had been accustomed to seeing the police- 
men going about in pairs for protection. 

It is not always the case, however, that more wages 
brings more comforts to the home. Often it only affords 
more means for enjoyment at the public house. If the 
worker is not steady in his habits, if he frequents the 
saloons with any degree of regularity, his increased pay 
nearly always means more ale and dissipation. And in 
the end this will mean more misery at home and the 
loss of his new prosperity. 

Everywhere it is evident that a great upheaval is go- 
ing on in the ranks of labor. The unions are becoming 
more aggressive and the socialists are exultant. The 
workers are determined that they will not go back to 
the pre-war conditions, and they are organizing to make 
good their claims. But many voices are calling to 
them, and the course of the socialistic agitator is be- 
setting them. They should have a care lest these "reds" 
lead them astray into a radicalism that will prevent 
the reforms that should really be made permanent. 
Once I clambered up some rickety stairs to find the edi- 
torial sanctum of a radical labor journal. Those in 
charge are a socialistic, irreligious horde of agitators 
who are moving heaven and earth to make the workers 
demand more benefits than they are now receiving and 
to set in motion the machinery that will enable them 



AMONG THE TOILERS 251 

to retain such benefits after the war. "A Pound a 
Day" — that is their motto, and this pound a day for 
the workers is to be guaranteed by the state and paid 
through a system of conscription of wealth. The state 
must own all industries, and then these industries must 
be placed in the hands of the workers. The House of 
Lords is to be abolished, along with all titles — an excel- 
lent reform, by the way — and an industrial department 
or chamber of the government is to be created to take 
its place. The soldiers must receive a living wage and 
be given complete self-government, while wives and all 
others engaged in household duties are to receive regu- 
lar wages. There must be political rights for all per- 
sons regardless of sex or condition and the workers are 
to be closely organized to prevent another war. 

Certainly this is a comprehensive program, and the 
agitators boldly announce that this is but the beginning. 
Most of the details will be likely to end at this begin- 
ning, for I do not find that the movement is taken seri- 
ously by the people at large and no great per cent of the 
workers themselves are enlisted in it. The agitators 
sought to succeed through the organization of a Sol- 
diers and Workers Council, an idea no doubt borrowed 
from the Russian revolutionists, but recent events in 
Russia have perhaps served to blast the hopes of those 
who pinned their faith to the methods there adopted. 
But out of it all there will come a more democratic 
England. It is the day of the people. They are just 
being born. And their birth is the greatest need of 
Britain and all the other nations of the earth. 



CHAPTEE XII 



A HERITAGE OF HATE 



The most deplorable effect of the war is not the de- 
struction of property or even the tremendous sacrifice 
of human life; it is, rather, the storm of bitter hatred 
which sweeps the world and fills human hearts with its 
poison. It is perhaps inevitable that in a struggle so 
fierce and prolonged as the present conflict, antagonism 
of the most intense degree should arise, but it is .some- 
what shocking to find that nations deliberately and of- 
ficially seek to cultivate and instill such venom into the 
souls of their people. Most people seem to believe that 
such sentiments are not only unavoidable, but that they 
are also necessary and salutary, in that they secure soli- 
darity of opinion and public support for the war. It is 
argued that men will fight better and civilians will sac- 
rifice more if they are made to despise the people against 
whom their country battles. One side of this argument, 
however, seems to be negatived by the fact that the sol- 
diers do not hate nearly so fiercely as they fight, and 
that the people at home possess almost a monopoly of the 
venom. This is the theory, however, upon which Europe 
is proceeding, and it is destined to bequeath to the people 
a heritage of hatred which will adversely affect the na- 

252 



A HERITAGE OF HATE 253 

tional character for two or three generations and prevent 
fraternal intercourse between the people of the nations 
now pitted against each other even after peace has been 
declared. 

Germany led the way in this propaganda of hate. 
The world was rightly shocked when the Germans pub- 
lished their "Hymn of Hate" against England, for it 
showed a side of the Germanic character which most of 
us did not know existed. And since that time it has 
been amazing to witness the deliberateness with which 
this nation has encouraged her people, even the chil- 
dren in the schools, to hate the foe — especially England, 
since England's entrance into the war effectually 
blocked the plans of conquest which the German mili- 
tary machine had so carefully laid. If any efficiency 
comes from it, surely this nation has reaped the full 
benefit. Men who were known around the world as the 
exponents of the purest idealism — men like Eucken, 
Deissman, Harnack — at the beginning of hostilities 
threw to the dogs their lifelong principles and sent out 
manifestoes and pronouncements so absurd and bitter 
that they amazed the world; Eucken's deliverance on 
"The Perfidy of England," for example, is the negation 
of everything this philosopher has taught in the course 
of his long life. The Germans have sung their Hymn 
of Hate, they have spread stories of English surgeons 
plucking out the eyes of the wounded and prisoners, they 
have exulted and celebrated when their aircraft have 
raided defenseless cities and destroyed hospitals, their 
preachers have declared the will of God demanded the 



254 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

destruction of trie enemy, they have prayed that their 
shell-fire might have divine direction, they have declared 
that the man who cannot put away pity is no true 
Christian, and they have denounced as anti-German the 
person who felt sympathy with the murdered innocents 
on the Lusitania. All these things they have done while 
the world stood in amazement, and Germany has fought 
so furiously because of the venom that rankled in the 
hearts of these people. 

Germany, with official sanction, deliberately stirred 
up her people to hate America, Americans, and every- 
thing American ; she stamped "Gott Strafe England und 
America" on her currency, she draped the Stars and 
Stripes with a border of crepe, she printed a bloody 
hand on the Declaration of Independence, she struck a 
medal in caricature of President Wilson and Uncle Sam 
and another to celebrate the sinking of the Lusitania, she 
published a newspaper for the express purpose of carry- 
ing on a propaganda against the United States, and she 
insulted our citizens and diplomatic officials in her bor- 
ders — and all this while we were at peace with her. 
And all the while her poets, singers, teachers, philoso- 
phers, scientists, writers, theologians, and preachers were 
breathing forth denunciations so vile and calumny so 
bitter that they inflamed the hearts of the populace with 
a hatred hitherto unknown in the world. As we read 
these statements, which are reenforced by the doctrine 
that Germany is the "kingdom of God on earth," that 
she is the center of God's plans, that the Bible is her 
peculiar possession, that the sufferings of Christ were 



A HERITAGE OF HATE 255 

the types of the present suffering of the Fatherland, and 
that all others outside Germany constitute the hosts of 
Antichrist, we cannot repress a shudder at the cold- 
bloodedness of this campaign of hatred. (These teach- 
ings are reproduced for us in the American govern- 
ment's publication, "Conquest and Kultur," "Ger- 
many's Madness" by Reich, "Gems of German 
Thought," compiled by William Archer, and especially 
in "Hurrah and Hallelujah," by Dr. J. P. Bang.) 

We must not, however, imagine that the Germans 
have a monopoly on hatred and that the Allied nations 
return good for evil in this regard. It is true that they 
have not cultivated the spirit as a national policy nor 
given official encouragement to it as have the Germans, 
nor is their hatred nearly so venomous as that of their 
enemy, to judge from the evidences in our possession. 
Among the Allies it seems to spring mainly from the 
lower orders of society, instead of from the upper strata 
as in Germany. And in spite of it all the Entente have 
kept themselves within bounds and have conducted the 
war according to the established usages, while the Ger- 
mans have been guilty of barbarities and atrocities which 
have shocked the world. Nevertheless there blazes in 
Europe the most intense hatred of Germany, so wide- 
spread and universal that one who presumes to question 
or deplore it at once lays himself liable to the suspicion 
of disloyalty. 

On one occasion I chanced to voice the dismay 
with which I beheld such hatred to a prominent 
French journalist in Paris. "Why should we not hate 



256 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

the Germans?" he answered quickly. "Consider the 
things they have done, the outrages they have committed 
without provocation. Does not this war and all that it 
means justify hatred of the people who caused it ? Wait 
until your American casualty list begins to grow, and 
then you will hate them as cordially as we. Anyway, 
how can you support a war without making the rank 
and file of the people hate the enemy so heartily that 
they will endure any sacrifice in order to exterminate 
him ?" I was of the opinion that it were more prefer- 
able to support the war by pure patriotism and loyalty 
to righteousness and truth. But they cannot see the 
matter in this light ; the doctrine of loving one's enemy 
has been thoroughly repudiated in this war, and the im- 
precatory Psalms are at last vindicated from a mass 
of calumny which has been cast upon them. 

All over Europe I saw signs in the windows of the 
business houses informing the people that no native of 
an enemy country is in the employ of that firm; my 
hotel in London displayed this placard : "No German, 
Austrian, Bulgarian, or Turk, whether naturalized or 
not, is in our service." Names of streets, parks, towns, 
firms, and even families have been changed because of 
their German origin or sound. There has been an agi- 
tation in London to change the name of Jermyn street 
because its pronunciation reminds one of "German." 
I was informed that the all-British manufacturers of a 
certain well-known brand of Egyptian cigarettes had 
suffered severe reverses because of the Turkish sound 
of the name, and many factories have been forced to 




LE VIEUX DIEU ALlEMAND" 
THE FRENCH CONCEPTION OF THE GERMAN GOD 



A HERITAGE OF HATE 257 

abandon the names under which their products had 
long been made and popularized. These things reached 
the height of absurdity when the King of England, Ger- 
man to the core in his ancestry, went to the extreme of 
changing the name of his house. One woman advocated 
to me the theory that all persons with German blood — 
"from royalty down" — should be interned, while it is 
nothing unusual to hear men insist that in order to save 
food the armies should take no more prisoners. I was 
crossing the Channel one night and learned that a cer- 
tain passenger was of German extraction. This fact I 
unwittingly revealed to some of the voyagers, and it 
instantly created a sensation on board ; "Good God," ex- 
claimed an officer in a horrified tone. The matter was 
duly reported to the military officials at Southampton, 
and although the man was a native-born British subject, 
and although his credentials were all in good shape, he 
was detained at the port and was in custody when my 
train left. 

In Rome the populace regards one end of the Quirinal 
Palace as tainted, and I was told that the King would 
no longer occupy it, because it was used by the 
Kaiser on the occasion of his visit to Victor Emmanuel. 
There has even been a demand for the destruction of 
the magnificent marble statue of Goethe which the 
Kaiser presented to Italy and which stands in the Park 
of Rome, and this demand became so insistent that it 
was necessary to throw about the statue a cordon of 
soldiers. One clay I was in the Vatican galleries look- 
ing upon a painting which depicted a thrilling battle 



SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

between the ancient Romans and an army of Huns un- 
der the terrible Attila, and when I remarked upon the 
beauty of the picture to a man standing near he replied : 
"They were the only people who knew how to treat the 
Germans." 

These little incidents, and such things occur daily 
in all parts of Europe, so much so that if one 
kept a record the number coming under his observa- 
tion would soon number into the thousands, indicate in 
a small way the deep-seated nature of the prejudice 
and bitter hatred which has taken hold on the hearts 
of the people. I do not hesitate to declare that this is 
the most unfortunate phase of the war — none the less 
unfortunate because unavoidable and necessary. We 
can repopulate the world more quickly than we can 
eradicate from human character the baneful results of 
such sentiments. All over Europe little children have 
their souls filled with the venom of hatred, and one 
grieves to think of the effect which this condition will 
exert on the budding life. 

There is in England a large and influential Anti- 
German Society which was established for the avowed 
purpose of carrying on a relentless crusade against all 
things German — and there is a powerful Erench so- 
ciety, with its solemn watchword, "Remember," which 
exists for a similar purpose. In the first place, this 
society undertook the task of bringing about the intern- 
ment of all the Germans in the country, "whether nat- 
uralized or not." They were ferreted out carefully and 
were diligently observed for any clew upon which a 



A HERITAGE OF HATE 259 

charge of suspicious action might be hung; sometimes 
it was no more serious than using the German language ; 
and so successful was this campaign that practically all 
who were in any way connected with an enemy country 
are to-day prisoners. Their business connections have 
been ruined, their properties confiscated, and even the 
German Churches have been taken over in some places. 
The next move was to turn the guns upon the German 
language, and there arose a widespread protest against 
the inclusion of this language in the curricula of the 
schools. This movement met with some opposition, how- 
ever, and I encountered a book, written by a professor 
whose task was the teaching of this language, strongly 
opposing the movement. 

But in spite of this antagonism the German prisoners 
of war in all lands of the Allies are well treated and 
seem perfectly content with their lot; they are indeed 
the happiest people I encountered in Europe. They 
sing as they are marched in from the fronts, and they 
wear the most genial of smiles as they work in the vari- 
ous camps or on the streets. They surrender very read- 
ily, and none of those I encountered displayed the slight- 
est desire to get away from their present environment. 
The treatment these prisoners receive is in marked con- 
trast to what they have been told awaited them should 
they fall into the hands of the enemy; it is also in 
marked contrast to the treatment accorded by the Ger- 
man authorities to the prisoners who are so unfortunate 
as to be taken by them — witness the case cited by Am- 
bassador Gerard wherein certain German townspeople 



260 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

were published as being unworthy of the German name 
because they had "mistreated prisoners of war/' the 
"mistreatment" being the act of giving cold water to 
the famishing unfortunates. 

The spirit of hate in some quarters, however, resents 
this mild treatment of the prisoners, and it is not too 
much to say that if some Englishmen had a free hand 
the actual situation in England would coincide approx- 
imately with the situation in Germany as it is pictured 
by the English press and believed to be by the people. 
Recently it was reported that a captured German officer 
of high rank was taken to a social function by the offi- 
cers in command of the prison camp, and this incident 
became the text for a bitter protest on the part of a 
well-known London newspaper. I read one day an ad- 
vertisement in a paper to the effect that a widow would 
rent some rooms and that "persons of enemy extraction 
were not excluded." A day later there appeared in 
another periodical a furious denunciation of this ad- 
vertisement, and this editorial ended with the state- 
ment: "We will be false to the dead if we ever learn 
to tolerate the unspeakable Hun." 

This bitterness has gone to such an extreme that the 
Anti-German Society has actually opposed all the social 
agencies which have sought to do work among the pris- 
oners. The Y. M. C. A. carries on an extensive work 
among them, supplying them with books, games, teach- 
ers, preachers, and sermons printed in their own lan- 
guage. In this work it has met the steady opposition 
of the Anti-German Society, which takes the position 



A HERITAGE OF HATE 261 

that nothing should be clone for the prisoners whatever. 
The headquarters for this work were transferred to the 
American Y. M. C. A. and placed in charge of an 
American secretary, but still it was hampered and 
hindered in many ways by the organized hatred. 

The intensity of this hatred finds a lurid reflection 
through the press and sometimes in the public utter- 
ances of well placed men. Even after hostilities had 
ceased and the German fleet had been surrendered, no 
less a person than Admiral Sir David Beatty, Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the British grand fleet, delivered 
himself of these remarks to his men: 

"We know that the British sailor has a large heart and 
a short memory. Try to harden the heart and lengthen the 
memory. And remember, the enemy which you are looking 
after is a despicable beast, neither more nor less. He is not 
worthy of the life of one blue jacket in the grand fleet.' ' 

Surely this is as Hunnish a sentiment as anything we 
have attributed to the German. 

On one occasion a German prisoner, in reply to a 
taunt, spat at an ex-soldier who had been wounded ; the 
Englishman at once knocked down the prisoner, for 
which offense he was fined four shillings. Belative to 
this case a certain journal published the following edi- 
torial : 

"Few more humiliating pictures have been presented 
to the mind's eye than that of a decent German-hating 
Englishman being fined and lectured by an English 
magistrate. I don't know the name of the Chairman 
of the Long Ashton Bench who committed this offense. 



262 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

If I did I would print it in the biggest type I could 
find, and in spite of the D. O. R. A. and every other 
influence which prevents honest men expressing their 
opinions, I would denounce him from one end of the 
country to the other. And at the same time I would 
write the name of the prisoner in letters of gold. For 
Charles Ridge is a hero. He knocked down a dirty 
German prisoner who spat at him and said, 'If a Ger- 
man spits at me again I shall knock him down again.' 
Bravo, Charles Ridge ! We are proud of you. 

"Every one has read with burning shame the case of 
Charles Ridge. He is lame ; he has served in the Mer- 
cantile Marine, in the Navy, in the Army. When he 
was at Ostend early in the war he saw many mutilated 
Belgian women. He remembers, and he hates. And 
so when he saw a group of our pampered German pris- 
oners walking along a country road singing and smok- 
ing, his spirit burned within him. He asked the soldier 
in charge of these Huns if any of them spoke English, 
and of one who could he inquired whether he remem- 
bered the Lusitania. The answer of the swine was to 
spit in his face. And promptly Charles Ridge knocked 
him down. The dirty Hun can do as he pleases; the 
honest Englishman who has fought and has been lamed 
fighting, is expected to turn the other cheek. Ridge 
would have been unworthy of his fine record, of his 
British manhood, if he had failed to reply to the insult. 
Thank God, he did not fail ! 

"So let us pay tribute to the manliness of Charles 
Ridge, and do so by remembering and hating. Nearly 



A HERITAGE OF HATE 263 

four years of war with a bestial and despicable foe, and 
we do not yet bate him properly. I should like to see 
every man who hates Germany and the Germans — yes, 
and every woman, too, for the women are the best haters 
of the Hun — joined together in solemn league and cov- 
enant to keep this hate for the Hun alive so long as they 
have breath in their bodies and then to hand on the 
legacy of hate to their children. A League of Hate — 
that is what we want. 

"In the face of infamies unmentionable, with the 
knowledge of foul murders by sea and land, in the face 
of accumulated evidence and piled-up horrors, there are 
those who to-morrow would make friends with the Hun 
and take his blood-stained hand in the grasp of amity. 
In the name of true patriotism, let us exalt the deed of 
Charles Ridge. Remember — and Hate!" 

When Count Mirbach, the German Ambassador to 
Russia, was assassinated a full column leading editorial 
in a prominent London daily contained such sections as 
these: 

"We hope his fate will be shared by the rest of the 
criminals who have lied, murdered, oppressed, and vio- 
lated at the command of the German Emperor. There 
are in truth but two appropriate endings for these peo- 
ple. One is the assassin's knife; the other the hang- 
man's rope. We should prefer, as a matter of taste, that 
justice in the case of these men should take an orderly 
and decent course; but the main thing is that justice 
should be done. 



264 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

"We can readily imagine that these remarks will 
cause some pain in certain English circles, in which a 
Prussian aristocrat may still be regarded as 'almost an 
English boy.' We can quite understand the shock the 
Foreign Office mind experiences when approval is 
openly expressed of the removal of an Ambassador and 
a Count to boot. 

"But English people, we believe, will feel no such 
emotion of outraged propriety. They will see in Mir- 
bach's fate justice and nothing more. 

"The only hopeful kind of peace is one of which the 
essential preliminary is the punishment of men like 
Mirbach, either by the rough justice of assassination or 
the more ordered operation of a revolutionary tribunal. 
And the German people, we think, should be told plainly 
what is expected of them if they are ever to regain their 
place in the company of civilized nations." 

The following article from the London Evening 
Standard will speak for itself: 

"It fills us with amazement to read that, after nearly 
four years of war with Germany, any body of British 
subjects should be ready to address to Germans such a 
communication as the appeal of the Order of St. John 
of Jerusalem to the Prussian Order of St. John. 

"]STo doubt this thing has been done with the worthiest 
motives. It is an attempt to restore and maintain the 
'highest standard of Christian generosity, charity, 
mercy, and honor' in the conduct of the war. But the 
princely and noble members of the Order of St. John 



A HERITAGE OF HATE 265 

hardly seem to realize what is implied in this respect- 
fully worded and even humble appeal to the 'Most Il- 
lustrious Grand Master of the Bailiwick of Branden- 
burg and the Knights of Justice, Knights of Honour, 
the other Members of the Johanniter Order.' 

"Who are these Knights of Justice and Knights of 
Honour of the Prussian Order of St. John ? They are 
members of the Prussian aristocracy. They are pre- 
cisely the men who plotted this war, who prepared for 
it with an organized hypocrisy such as the world has 
never seen before, and who have carried it on with cool, 
deliberate, and appalling brutality. The Protector of 
the Prussian Order of St. John is the Kaiser himself; 
its Grand Master is a Prussian notable ; its knights are 
the same kind of people who have bombed our towns, 
sunk our ships, murdered our women and children, or- 
dered massacres, burnings and rapings in France, Bel- 
gium, Serbia, Poland and Rumania, made war on our 
wounded, starved our prisoners, and — to cut short the 
catalogue — been guilty of every kind of crime and 
meanness which the most perverted imagination can con- 
ceive and the bloodiest hand can carry out. 

"These people are rightly looked on by the average 
Briton as criminals of the lowest type. Ordinary peo- 
ple, who have given their dearest for this crusade against 
Germany, regard these princely robbers and murderers 
as occupying precisely the same moral level as the late 
Charles Peace and Dr. Crippen. They regard them as 
more culpable than the brutal German private who kills 



266 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

young girls and twirls babies on bis bayonet. Tbe pri- 
vate is no doubt a willing pupil in blackguardism, but 
be is only a pupil ; the true inspiration in f rightfulness 
conies from above. 

"Yet these Prussian blackguards are addressed as if 
they were civilized gentlemen — the social and moral 
equals of our own Princes and Nobles. It is gently 
hinted that Germany may have been led into some small 
errors of taste in her waging of war. 'Certain bellig- 
erent acts/ say the petitioners — for they occupy that 
position — 'appear to us to be opposed to the declara- 
tions, maxims, and professions of our ancient and illus- 
trious Order of Christian Chivalry.' The British mem- 
bers 'beg' the 'noble' German members to exercise their 
influence with 'His Imperial Majesty the German Em- 
peror,' and they 'regret' to record their opinion that the 
Imperial Government has 'not always acted up to the 
ideals and laws of our Christian brotherhood.' But they 
'appeal with confidence' to the 'eminent members' in 
Germany to unite in upholding the ideals of the Order. 

"How, in the name of common sense, can we expect 
the German people to repudiate, as beyond the pale of 
decency, their rulers, when our own ^Notables treat them 
as if they were men of honor?" 

It is a deplorable state into which the world has 
drifted. To move in such an atmosphere is decidedly 
depressing and it is gradually robbing the people of 
their finer sensibilities. Profanity springs more easily 
to their lips when venom rankles in the breast. We 



A HERITAGE OF HATE 267 

should pray to be delivered from it, even though in the 
present crisis, in view of the unspeakable barbarities 
committed by the enemy, it is perhaps as justifiable as 
such sentiments can ever be. 



CHAPTER XIII 

THE CITIES OF HOBRIBLE NIGHTS 

"This war would be a jolly show if there were no 
nights/' said an officer on the Western front; and the 
people back at home might have said, "And we could 
keep our spirits up much better if it were always day- 
time." Nearly all the cities of Europe during the 
war were cities of horrible nights. There were no 
lights, the streets were enveloped in dismal darkness, 
through the gloom taxicabs dashed here and there, the 
throngs moved along like specters through a mist, and 
the courtesans nocked out by thousands to follow their 
uninterrupted solicitations. At nightfall every window 
and door must be closed and every curtain drawn, for 
severe penalties were visited on those who allowed beams 
of light to escape from store or apartment. In the the- 
aters and cafes there were scenes of riotous jollity and 
brilliancy, but on the streets all was darkness and gloom. 
The situation "got on my nerves," for the facts and the 
agencies of darkness so constantly confronted became 
decidedly depressing. 

But the real horror of the nights was constituted by 
what did and what might happen while they spread 
blackness over the world. Then villainy of the most 

268 



CITIES OF HORRIBLE NIGHTS 269 

unspeakable kind was enacted, then men and women 
sacrificed their honor, their souls, their homes — and the 
happy homes of other people also — then the soldiers 
from overseas were set upon by harpies and tricksters, 
and then the enemy avions came to spread death among 
helpless women and little children. The most terrible 
experiences of the war, at home and on the fronts, in 
its actual effects, occurred at night. 

I have been in the center of more than forty air 
raids, and this number does not include hundreds of 
air battles which have taken place above my head on 
the front or the large number which I have witnessed 
from a distance, and of them all only two occurred in 
the light of day. The first one I ever experienced was 
in London at nine o'clock in the morning, and this was 
the largest day-time raid which ever reached the English 
capital; the last raid I ever saw in London began at 
eleven o'clock in the night and passed at three o'clock 
in the morning, and this was the worst raid ever experi- 
enced by any city, either in the day or night. 

When the Boche raiders came to London that July 
morning I had taken a taxicab and was being driven to 
the Liverpool Street station. The taxicab was directly 
in front of the great General Post Office, and suddenly 
there was a crashing roar more thunderous than any- 
thing I had ever heard before. The machine careened 
and plunged about in the street until it brought up on 
its side against a nearby pole, the earth trembled as if 
in the grasp of a mighty earthquake, and the air was 
suddenly full of flying debris — stone, wood, and glass. 



270 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

I pulled myself together and glanced through the door 
of the taxicab and understood that the General Post 
Office had been struck by a bomb dropped from an en- 
emy aircraft. I crawled out of the damaged automobile 
and, looking into the sky, witnessed the greatest spec- 
tacle of its kind ever enacted since the world began — one 
which a few months before belonged wholly in the 
realm of dreams; it was the world's greatest battle in 
the sky. 

I saw a flotilla of great enemy airships advance over 
the unprotected city in battle formation, spread out like 
a mighty fan, or a flock of geese flying south in the fall, 
led by the conspicuous machine of the commander, with 
the bomb carriers protected in the center of the V. 
They were flying very low and their speed seemed lei- 
surely enough, although they must have been moving 
at the speed of at least seventy-five miles an hour. Their 
lines were straight and it was apparent that they were 
under a strict discipline, evidently in anticipation of 
an attack from the British machines. The whirr of 
the engines could be distinctly heard; occasionally the 
sharp, clear rattle of a machine gun would pierce the 
morning air, then the deep boom of an anti-aircraft 
defense gun from the street, and a crashing roar of a 
bursting bomb dropped by the Hun. It was so sudden, 
so startling, so magnificent, that I stood riveted to the 
spot and scarcely comprehended what was taking place 
above and around me. 

±\u\v the British planes ascended. They circled and 
swept gracefully until they had attained the proper alti- 



CITIES OF HORRIBLE NIGHTS 271 

tude, and then without the slightest hesitancy drove 
full at the foe. So fierce was the onslaught that they 
broke his formation, and then the multitude of great 
battleships of the air mingled in an indiscriminate mass. 
Friend could not be distinguished from foe as they bat- 
tled in the clouds above my head. It would be vain to 
attempt an adequate description of this struggle, or to 
enable the average person to understand its grandeur 
or the awe with which a witness beheld it. They circled 
and dashed here and there madly, they maneuvered for 
position, they struggled with deadly fury. It was a 
floating and whirling mass of demons fighting furiously 
in the sky. Twice I saw machines swerve to one side 
from the group, reel unsteadily in the air for a moment, 
and then plunge downward, turning over and over as 
the pilots endeavored to regain control. And all the 
while the engines whirred, the machine guns rattled, 
the defense guns roared, and the bombs came streaking 
through the air to fall upon the heads of the -helpless 
women and children on the streets and to burst with a 
thunderous crash, spreading death and destruction 
everywhere. 

I was stunned by sentiments of wonder, pity, hatred, 
and fear ; I did not know how to move or where. Slowly 
I made my way through the crowd surrounding a 
wrecked building ; the devastation was terrible, fire was 
spreading, the dead were being removed, and the 
wounded were crying for help. Over in Piccadilly the 
street was littered with broken glass and bits of stone, 
scattered by the falling shrapnel. Near the gate of St. 



272 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

Paul's lay a great unexploded bomb, closely guarded by 
the police until soldiers should come and remove it. I 
came to a little church which had been utterly de- 
stroyed ; a young girl had been arranging flowers on the 
altar for the service on the following day when the 
deadly missile came crashing through the roof — and 
there lay her mangled body in the wreckage of the 
sacred altar she loved. Here was a row of flats housing 
many families, three stories high; a bomb had struck 
near the corner on the roof and had eaten its way to 
the ground, leaving a gaping wound through which one 
could see the interior of each apartment. Down in the 
east end the havoc was frightful ; the east always suffered 
from the raids, because the foe followed the course of 
the Thames in approaching London and naturally aimed 
at the docks and the Tower and Bridge, which presented 
a visible target to the raiders; this is why the poor 
people who inhabit this end of the city suffered so in- 
tensely from these attacks. In front of the Tower gate 
was a gaping hole in the stone street deep enough to 
bury a piano, some of the great iron pickets in the fence 
had been cut in two by the flying shrapnel, all of the 
windows in many blocks were broken, and here and 
there the little pools of blood upon the pavement told 
a sadder story. Some school children had been passing 
that way — if the enemy had known of it he would doubt- 
less have rubbed his hands in glee, for his record shows 
that he has a special predilection for children ! 

When the papers reached the streets they carried 
many columns about the great air-raid, but the censor 



CITIES OF HORRIBLE NIGHTS 273 

had been busy. No definite place could be mentioned 
in the stories lest the papers fall into the hands of the 
enemy and enable him to tell what section of London 
he was over, "A great public building had been 
wrecked" — but they dare not say it was the General 
Post Office. "A bomb fell in the yard of a prominent 
church/' but the name of the cathedral was carefully 
shielded. The power of the censor was strikingly seen 
when I read these accounts after witnessing the actual 
battle and personally visiting the destroyed sections. 
No pictures must be made until the official photographer 
sees fit to make them ! Standing near me on East Com- 
mercial street was a man with a large and fancifully 
carved cigarette holder, and when he fingered it loosely 
he was at once in the toils of the police ; " 'Ow do I 
know but it's a thing to tike pictures with as you've 
got ?" was the explanation which was given for its con- 
fiscation. And the official reports issued by the war 
office! They destroyed in me all confidence in official 
reports thereafter. It was announced that there were 
twenty-two enemy machines, and on the same page of a 
paper which published the report was a remarkable 
photograph made from the roof of a building showing 
more than sixty ! The officials reported that the British 
had sustained no injury whatever, and that evening in 
a hotel I met one of the aviators engaged who was weep- 
ing his heart out because the machine driven by his 
dearest friend had been brought down by shrapnel from 
a .defense gun shell and both occupants instantly 
killed. It was the usual thing after the raid, and after 



274 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

every raid, to hear people everywhere making prophe- 
cies concerning the forthcoming official report and its 
attempt to underestimate the damage done. But all of 
this was taken good-naturedly by the populace, since the 
people appreciated the necessity of preserving morale 
and courage and keeping all gratifying information 
from the enemy. 

The greatest raid of all occurred on the night of 
Whit Sunday, the anniversary of Pentecost ; at the close 
of the day when all England celebrated the descent of 
the Holy Spirit on the Apostles came the air Huns to 
send death down upon sleeping people; it was a Pente- 
cost of frightfulness for suffering London. I had just 
retired and extinguished my light when the alarm came, 
given by bursting "maroons," and a friend entered to 
invite me out into the hall, where a little group had 
already assembled ; his invitation was accepted, because 
the large windows in each of the rooms of my suite con- 
stituted a very great menace. We sat upon the steps 
for more than three hours during the world's greatest 
air attack. 

Twenty minutes after the first alarm a deep booming 
in the distance proved that the enemy had broken 
through the coast barrage and was proceeding to Lon- 
don, and for a few minutes we could mark his progress 
by the advancing roar. Then there was a sudden thun- 
dering near at hand as the guns of London came into 
action and began throwing a curtain of fire in the path 
of the Gotha fleet. 'No one of our party spoke, for all 
were enthralled with interest as we listened to the great 



CITIES OF HORRIBLE NIGHTS 275 

batteries striving so hotly for our protection. Now 
there came a crash so thunderous that all the others were 
surpassed in volume, the building trembled from the 
force of the concussion, the windows began the rattle 
that scarcely ceased until the raiders had gone, one of 
the women gave a frightened little scream and stopped 
her ears with her hands — the foe was upon us and his 
first torpedo had scored a direct hit. 

Now the streets were silent but the skies were full 
of din. Taxicabs no longer went honking about, motor 
busses had ceased their rumbling, and the crowds did 
not create their customary hubbub, for the avenues were 
deserted. But above our heads we could hear the inter- 
mittent whirring of the peculiar German engine, the 
sharp, clear rattle of machine guns, and the sullen burst- 
ing of British shells ; while ever and anon the very earth 
would stagger as a missile well placed wrought its havoc. 

Twice I went to the door and surveyed the scene 
above. It was wonderful ! A score of mighty search- 
lights were stabbing the darkness and sweeping the 
heavens while the lovely star-shells hanging here and 
there illuminated the skies. There were just enough 
clouds to make a background for the bursting shells, and 
against them the lurid and devilish flashes were con- 
stantly playing. Here and there one caught momentary 
glimpses of an enemy air craft, as it emerged from or 
disappeared behind a cloud, or as it was caught in the 
sweep of a searchlight. Once three great rays focussed 
on one of the machines, and its maneuvers were remark- 
able; it dashed upwards and then turned downward, it 



276 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

swept from side to side, it plunged and careened in des : 
perate attempts to escape the revealing light, and all 
the while hundreds of shells were screaming towards it. 
I saw the plane reel unsteadily in the air for a moment 
and then dip downward suddenly, flames shot up and 
enveloped it, the pilot leaped away into the air, to fall 
two miles and strike upon the London pavement, while 
the burning battleship of the sky came down a ruined 
mass. It was a remarkable scene, but I was haunted 
for weeks by the memory of that man leaping free from 
his machine. 

This continued for more than three hours, as we sat 
on the steps and waited until the trumpets of the Boy 
Scouts sounded "All Clear." There was no use in seek- 
ing a better refuge; the best protection was always to 
remain at home and be quiet, for any good wall would 
resist shrapnel bits and none of them could protect their 
occupants in the event of a direct hit. The tubes were 
safe enough if one dared to go through the streets to 
reach them, but comparatively few people sought their 
shelter. It fell to my lot to carry into the subway dur- 
ing one raid a lady who fainted before my door, and 
then I understood the prejudice against the places which 
kept the "better element" away. It was filled with a 
motley crowd of Jews and foreigners, although it was 
in the west end of London. Children lay about the 
floor on dirty and tattered blankets, filthy and disrep- 
utable-looking specimens of humanity thronged the 
place, and the odor was intolerable. Most people pre- 
ferred the bombs of the Boche to the germs of the under- 



CITIES OF HORRIBLE NIGHTS 277 

ground. This situation in the tubes was immortalized 
by a popular painting in which the artist depicted the 
crowds in the Elephant and Castle station during an air- 
raid in a most realistic manner. 

As we sat upon the steps no fear was visible in our 
little company, even though one young lady was so 
nervous that she must needs rest her head on her pro- 
tector's knee. There were wine and cigarettes in abun- 
dance and one friend produced some biscuits ; one of the 
maids read her book and made scarcely a comment. The 
conversation dwelt on other things for the most part 
and concerned the air-raid only when a bomb fell un- 
usually near or some one returned from the door with a 
new report. Nowhere in Europe, be it said, did I ever 
see any noticeable fear on the part of the people, save 
in one or two detached instances in which single indi- 
viduals werefconcerned. 

After the raid we went out to observe the effects. It 
seemed that half of London must have been razed by 
the terrible bombardment, yet it required diligent 
search to find any damage that had been done. A few 
poor houses destroyed, several women and children 
killed — that was all. But one aerial torpedo wrought 
an unbelievable havoc. It fell in Maida Yale and 
scored a direct hit on a block of stone mansions, three 
or four stories in height. Eive of these were leveled 
as completely as if house wreckers had been at work, the 
top stories of three houses across the street were knocked 
down and these houses were set on fire, and all the 
buildings in the* block, on both sides of the street, about 



278 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

fifty of them, were so injured as to be rendered unin- 
habitable. The residents were evacuated, the block was 
boarded in and placed under guard, and there it remains 
until this day. Such was the force of one torpedo. 

I had often wondered how the people acted and felt 
during an air-raid. They were perfectly helpless, of 
course, and there was little to be done save to seek shel- 
ter in the most secure spot. Hundreds of them came 
flocking out to observe, and while bombs rained down 
the people gazed curiously and the school children, if 
the raid was in day time, stood at "attention" and sang 
"Rule Britannia." I saw little terror on the streets dur- 
ing any raid and heard little comment to indicate that 
such warfare spread any noticeable degree of panic 
among the people. Mainly the people kept inside and 
trusted to Providence ; the curious flocked to 4 the street 
to observe "the show." Perhaps the greatest danger is 
not from the descending bombs of the foe; rather is it 
from the flying shrapnel of the friend. Each shell sent 
against the enemy must come down somewhere, and the 
falling pieces of steel destroy windows and injure peo- 
ple over a wide area. 

The wonderfully preserved morale of the people indi- 
cated to me the fact that Germany was defeating her 
own purpose by such barbarous methods of murdering 
the helpless non-combatants in undefended cities. (But 
of course Germany does not regard London as unde- 
fended, since she excused herself for these attacks by 
issuing a manifesto declaring that London was no longer 
unfortified, since she had mounted anti-aircraft defense 



CITIES OF HORRIBLE NIGHTS 279 

guns!) Her purpose was the same as that back of the 
unspeakable ruthlessness which she has practiced and 
encouraged in Belgium, France, Poland, Serbia, Ru- 
mania, Armenia, and everywhere else she has planted 
her hoof — to terrorize the people and break their spirits 
to such a degree that they will demand peace. But the 
actual result was to anger the people and make them 
more determined in their conviction that such a foe 
must be completely crushed. Hence nothing that Ger- 
many could have done would have had such a tendency 
to unify the sentiment of the nation. Ruthlessness run- 
ning amuck enabled Great Britain to raise by the vol- 
unteer system a mighty army, and it steadily and surely 
defeated its own aim. 

The air-raids always gave a new impetus to the pop- 
ular movement for reprisals, until they were under- 
taken. The king came out upon the street to view the dev- 
astation of one raid, and as he stood gazing upon a 
wrecked building he remarked, "I wish that those who 
oppose reprisals could witness this scene." The king fa- 
vored a reprisal policy, but of course the will of his maj- 
esty has not the least influence in the conduct of affairs 
in Great Britain ! England for a long time held herself 
aloof from such methods, under the pressure of a senti- 
ment molded and led by such men as the Archbishop of 
Canterbury and Dr. Sanday of Oxford. The argument 
was that the English skirts were clear and must be kept 
so, and the fact that Germany so far forgot herself as 
to violate international precedent and outrage righteous 
conceptions by slaughtering the innocents would not 



280 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

justify England in adopting the same tactics. This was 
a noble stand to be taken by a nation which went to 
war in defense of a weaker power and a solemn treaty, 
and if it had been maintained until the end of the war 
it would have cleared the English name of many a blot 
which her past actions have placed upon it. 

In the matter of air raids the cities of France nat- 
urally suffered more than the cities of England ; I was 
in Paris when the avions came over eleven successive 
nights, while at the same time the "gros Bertha" was 
bombarding the beautiful capital of the French and the 
deep imprecations of the guns thundering at the gates 
could be heard constantly. Everywhere in Paris and in 
other French towns there were signs pointing to the 
nearby "Abris contre bombardment," and these "caves" 
were designated by posters stating the number of per- 
sons who could take refuge there in the event of an 
attack. The barrage north of Paris and around the city 
was quite efficient, but anti-aircraft guns were always 
surprisingly helpless in beating off an attack or keeping 
the foe behind his own lines. I have seen flotillas of 
German airships sail calmly on through a stream of 
shells sweeping their path so thoroughly that the ex- 
plosions left patches of smoke forming practically solid 
lines across the sky, and it was not at all unusual to 
see the airmen go above a barrage, sailing so high that 
they absolutely disappeared in the blue heavens. 

On one occasion I went into Paris for the express 
purpose of associating with the people in an hour of 
supreme crisis. The city was being bombarded during 



CITIES OF HORRIBLE NIGHTS 281 

the day and raided at night ; there was a sinister story 
in the laconic communiques of the war office: "The 
long-range gun resumed the bombardment of the Paris 
district this morning," and a a fleet of enemy aircraft 
crossed our lines last night going in the direction of 
Paris at 11 P. M. ; the 'all clear' was given at 1 A. M." 
On the very first night of this visit the unearthly shriek 
of the siren sounded on schedule time, and as its shrill 
voice died away there was silence. One could hear no 
excited voices and no sound of frightened feet scurrying 
to shelter. A group gathered in the tea room of the 
hotel, away from the windows, and awaited the visitors. 
They arrived in due time, accompanied by the rumble 
of the guns and the general din of battle, and remained 
as unwelcome guests for nearly an hour. While this 
raid, which did not materially differ from all others of 
its kind, was in progress there was a smaller degree of 
excitement in this group and among the general popula- 
tion than was usually observed in London on similar 
occasions. But the tension among our company in the 
hotel was relieved by a belated discovery which caused 
great amusement: we found that in our eagerness to 
avoid windows and places of undue hazard we had 
taken refuge in a tea room built in the court of the 
hotel, and the only barrier between us and the bombs 
of the Hun had been the art glass roof above our heads ! 
More terrible were the afflictions which the Boche 
visited upon the cities near the fronts; and more 
demoralizing to the nerves of the people in such places 
were their experiences. I was in Toul one night when 



282 SOCIAL STUDIES OF THE WAR 

there were six air-raids, and there for the first and only 
time I suffered from excessive fear. Time and again 
during the night we heard the siren warn the people 
and there was little respite from danger, while there 
were some unusual features which made the raid seem 
more terrible here than elsewhere. The city was much 
smaller than Paris and the guns and enemy planes could 
be heard more distinctly, so that one was prone to believe 
the enemy was hovering immediately over his head and 
taking accurate aim at the cot on which he happened to 
be lying. Still worse were the cathedral bells, for in 
Toul the bells began ringing when the enemy reached 
the city and continued until he was well on his way back 
to his own lines. And then there were the automatic 
rifles. In bombarding a small city the aviators must of 
necessity fly much lower than in the case of London or 
Paris, and in so doing they came oftentimes in range 
of the automatics; and these guns were very effective 
in keeping the enemy high. The rattling of these 
weapons was unusually terrifying, for they made a 
noise for all the world like the creaking of a great tree 
in the agony of falling. When I heard them in 
Toul my first thought was that the cathedral had been 
bombed and one of the towers or walls was beginning 
to fall, but since the unearthly noise continued my con- 
clusion had to be revised. 

By all means the most terrifying of all my experiences 
were these air-raids in Toul. The sirens, the bells, the 
defense barrage, the automatics, the bombs, the engines, 
the crashes of splintered houses— all of these things so 



CITIES OF HORRIBLE NIGHTS 283 

heightened the sense of danger that terror was struck 
into my soul for the first time. I lay on my cot trem- 
bling like an aspen leaf and covered with the perspira- 
tion of fear. But the people did not seem to share my 
apprehension, for no more anxiety was observed in Toul 
than in other and larger cities which were subjected to 
similar torments. On one occasion I was dining in a 
company when the siren sounded ; not one of the diners 
gave the slightest heed, the topic under consideration 
was not changed, no mention was made of the alarm, 
and there was not even a pteuse in the conversation. 
Thus calmly did the people regard the terror that flieth 
by night. 



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AUGUSTS, 1918. 



AMERICA IN EUROPE. 



PAGE THREE. 



Beware America! 

: 8ewar» *t MB** e»a to 

The long list of political assassinations 
already famished by four years of world- 
war, was again extended last week by the 
murderer's bomb which killed Fieldmarehai 
««g EHihlUH and bis aid-dS-caiBp von Drossier 
in Kiew, and in awe we ask who will be the 
' next victim. Humanity tins been almost 
•leadened against the countless cruelties of 
ibis wat bat it staggers every Individual to 
ihecoreto see lhat there fean infernal method 
in the employment of frenzied terrorists for 
political aims. It is significant that ao 
assassination, I hat of the Archduke Franz Ferdi- 
nand and his wife starlet this war. The 
responsibility for the murderous deed was 
immediately and justly laid at Serbia's door 
and the big Enropean Powers, from the 
start, took part, for or against the punishment 
. of Servia, England and Hassia leading in 
' the protest against this punishment. 11 is 
most remarkable now that all the a,ssassi- 
'nallona -perpetrated In the course of Ihe 
war, have been committed, in the interest, if 
»nl on the advice of the very powers who 
originally refused atonement for (he Servian 
murder and formed the ground-work of the 
Entente. On the other side, there is not a 
single case of assassination that was intended 
lo benefit the enemies of the Entente: Ihe 
bands of Germany, Austria, Bulgaria and 
Torky are not stained with the blood of 
assassinated victims. 

To: refresh our memory let us count up 
ihe murders as far as we know them. 

There was the murder of Jaures. He was 
killed because he was against war with 
Germany. If the Frcneli Government were 
I at all ahle to substitute another motive for 
! ihe crime, the murderer long ago would 
! have had his trial and in all likelihood his 
acquittal. Nothing of the kind, he still iu- 
itablls a narrow, cell in a Parisian prison and 
elamors for justice. Bui Clemencesu has 
more important things lo do than to sec lo 
it'that bis country is cleaned of the suspicion 
to protect political assassinators, — 

The wise, experienced and very influential 
'TTOTitan luiotoer Witta tsa» no friend of wai 
in general and more especially saw no 
: blessedness for his country in Ihe present 
[ war. He suddenly died after a meal and 
I the cook who prepared his last meal cannot 
possibly have been a friend of Germany. 
General PeBte. the Italian chief of Staff, 
rhad ideas about the inviolability of solemn 
i alliances, particularly the one that coupled 
H.ily, Austria and Germany together, ideas not 
at all shared by Sonnino and other members 
of the Italian war-parly; he must hare 
suddenly discovered 'that life was not worth 
living anymore for him. At least they say 
i in Italy, lhat Pollio, a man in the prime 
of life, cornrnitted suicide and Germany hadont' 
Triend less in Italy. — 

That Sir Roger basement ha- been brought 
lo death by le^al proceedings of a very special 
English sort we all ki 
! not be forgotten that Ihe English ambassador 
; m Christiania, Sir flnfay will never be aide 
lo clear himself of Ihe outrage that 
\ lie hired a Xorvcgian lo assassinate Rogei 
Casement, tb-2 Irish patriot. Millions havt 
■ ^eon the shameless dotuuient, written by Sii 
Finlay's own hand on the stationary of thi 
British Embassy, because excellent photo 
graphic reproductions have been published 
nnd distributed wherever English power soul" 
not supress them. In the United State 
lai-U.h influence, unfortunately, has bc-ei 
strong enough lo seriously restrict the pro 
mufgation of this monument of England 
infamy. All Hie more Uncle Sain should h 
asked if he had forgotten all about the goldei 
words with which George Washington warns 
his countrymen against cei 



bfy could give full information how king 
Karol came to die? 

At last the latest murders M Russia. Let 
the Bolsheviki call the assassination of Czar 
Nicholas a legal execution, history will clas- 
sify it differently. The Czar bad to die quickly 
because England is knocking at the door and 
will not allow Russia lo return Into a slate 
peace and settle her own affairs herself, 
after having ruined herself in 1he service of 
English imperialism. The murder of the Cwu- 

;rt»jnly was a Kussian crime, but the in- 

walor w«s the perfidious English diplomacy. 
Cetmt Mirt«u*» murder has already been 
proved to be the outcome ot a conspiracy 
between England and the Social-Revolutionists 
in order to overthrow the present Botshe- 
viki-regime, and we shall hear very soon the 
same about the ESehhoia*- and Dressier- 
murders. There Is only one nigger in the 

oodpile, and bis name is 



How do you like this kind of an Ally, dear 
tide Sam? Kot a very handsome physiog- 
nomy to be sure. Are you really williim to 
develop "a habit of fondness" for him till— 
against George Washington's warning — you 
become his political "slave''? Some say. yon 
are already pretty far advanced on the rood 
to it. Beware, Uncle Sam, beware 1 Your 
hands are slill clean, you have not taken part 
in any assassination, no not yet. but the last 
four years have shown convincingly that 
through political association withEngland even- 
nation is forced to gradually tower her own 
moral standard. You will not escape this fate, 
DncIeSam, you have already listened much too 
exclusively to England's shameless defamation 
of Germany, and like the thief trying to put 
the followers on a wrong scent cries himself 
"thief! thief!" so England fills the .air with 
cries of woe, woe over German outrages, 
hoping tints to hide from your attention the 
abominable crimes she is constantly commit- 
ting herself. In tbenameef George Washington, 
Uncle Sam, beware, beware! 



Workmen against the War. 



According to American papers, arrived lately, 
the I.W. W. chiefs arosendingoutthefollowitig 
circular in large quantities from Nibbing, Minn, 
their le-adquartcrs: 

"Workers in the Iron Induslrv : 

"Your attention is called to the fact lhat 
in Ibis Land of Liberty, the home of the 
free. Hundreds of our fellow workers have 
been arrested and thrown into jails that the 
workers have built for the reason thttt Ihey 
dtd not register because they know that the 
constitution of the United Stales docs not 
allow any force lo be practised on any man 
under the jurisdiction of the United Stnles, 
and because they do not believe in wars. 
mh\ practising for killing their lellow men, 
for the benefit of a few over-fed parasites, 
while they themselves are in urgent need 
of the necessities of life. 

"You fellow Workers think this over for 
a minute hi your head, and you will soon 
sec that if we workers do not help ourselves, 
master class will not help us. 

"We are here producing tin* iron of which 
ihe war rnacbineriesare until from. Thousand- 
of Ions of* our sweat and blood i< Mink in 
tin- bottom:, of tin .tie, ami millions of 



"Innocent fellow workers". 



LIST OF AMERICAN PRISONERS OF WAR cofitinurM:. 




AbeW. Joseph, Brooklyn, H.Y. J.R. 307 S.D 
Heoston, Urn, Aatoa-Torte. Pa, J.R. 90? 
HucheY. Qeorr«, Lehigh, Okie, l.K. 2* ' 
Leslie, Jatnee, North Tonawinca. N Y, J. MOT 
Waters, Netwo, Sew Haves, Conn, J.R. 108 
Wrijil, William, St. Davids. Pe.7Sed.Coi.*. 
Hickman. Fred, Loojootec, fad., 5. H.G. 
Lngassej Joseph, Bristol Coon , J B. 1Q» 
Whalen. John, Boston. Mass.. It <: -But. iOS 
Pope, Edward, GrtenabOro. ^L. J. R. IDS ■ 
McDonald, Georje, Brookhoe, San, JUKI 
Miclewskt, ftutee. providence. B.J, J R. 10* 
Cropper, Cbarb-i, Re* Haven, Coon . J. K. 10* 
"tephea. Erie, IV. CLS.A. liar, 6 
vie. Turin, N.Y., J.R.fcJ 
Troy, N.ST., J.R.W 



Sslero. NO, llu.S- 



right, beginning wit the upper line, 
Bollock. Chlcajo, HI, J.R 127 
Mc.Gioois, Eeao CI. ire. Wis, J.R. 128 
Otto, Milwaukee. Wis, i. H. IZt 
smtfh. Sacramento, Cut.. J R. 157 
l'teolo, 'While Pomh Mich. 1 R 127 
Ramaker. Waokejart, JIL, J.K. 127 



Tabolt, Lvle 
Brady, ~ 

Lynch, Je««y, Calen 
Ralph. Charles, Willi 
SierB. Frank, Netw, W.Va, J.R. -i 
Graham, Edward, St Loata, Wo, Mar. 6 
Smilh, Edward, Sierro. Wash, J.R. z2 ■ 
Woodman, Artltar, Elbont. JU„ En». * 
Fried, Adam F, NewOrleaus. La, Mar. 6 
Milliard, Roberts. KooiviIie,.Te»to . J.R.W 
Belt, Willtatn. Butctborn, Laaesshtoa. J.R. 83 
Clieckley. Willtini, PalersoD, N.V, Eaf. 8 
fling. Loots, Grayavitfe, O, Mar, $ 
Caoattero, Robert, Pftincoaronlie, La., Mar. 11 
Rouch, Ernest. Miltersborg, Pa.. J. If. 7 
Maher. Leo Roabory. Mass. M.G -Rail. 103 
Warren, Andrews. Meriden, Coao, J.R. 102 
Chiltv. fred, -New Haven, Coon,' } R 104 
French, Rrneet, Sew Karen, Conn, J R li 2- 



and the following officers: 

LieoL Tanoey.' Walter, St, Albans, J.R. 102 
Lieut. Mesay, v? . H.. Boston. Uass, Aviator 
First-LteoL Peckham, Charles, Tolode, O, 



' Lteot. Rauie, Blanchard B,, 
Eleut. Playlor, William B , Jefleraoo, «o, 
Lteol. Leyaon, B., Spokane, Wash., Aviator 



"ATROCITIES" DON't WORK 
WITH THE IRISH. 

Criticising Bemhard Shavrs latest book: 
"Hew^te ietHa-the-lrtsti tniestion" - 

John Leslie in "Justice ", a London Weekly, 
ridicules the British attenipt- of winning Irish 
sympathies" which are bound to fail. And 
why? Leslie an-«vr> thi, ijn.-.ti.-i, n- follows: 
"Because the Irish people do not believe 
in these atrocitie,. Am! ;ig;iin why? For u 
vert- good reason indeed. Because they have 
ha<i long and hitler evpnienee of that aniiabh- 
trait ill the character ot the Kn-h-li ^iv.-rning 
classes and the Press they control lo bes- 
mirch and blacken the character of their 
opponents for the. time being. AH have un- 
dergone it: Yankee, Frenchman, Russian, 
Hiniloo, 7.ulu, Boer, Arab, Egypliun mid Irish- 
man in ihe illustrated Press ,.i Ln^.oi.l until 
very- recently. The Englishman does Ibis 
thing and then forgets all, about it. As it 



American Papers on tha Irish question. 
t\EW YOI1K EVENING POST says: "Th 

lilt' has come r»r Lloyd '.'.cor.-,- lo make ; 
M decision. If there is ever lo be ai 

cape from the tragic lli-li nii|u"r. if Itfi 
in is not to go on for ever acting on tic 
-in. iplc licit of nil problems of -tab --inan-,ltij 
ic w...-'..| over, Ireland is the only one. Ilia 
bMpi !,---ly im-olvub!e. niev i> the opj.or 

,r lb, power the likelihood is thai ri'ltteuln 



The British Governtnent 

and Ireterid.- 

' .Has the Government gone stark, staring, 
mad in every Incident of Its actions Wwards 
ami n ragarit »n Ireland V a«is losepbljans^ 
foru in it letter to the Editor of the London 
Dnilii Ckrmkle, printed in that paper of 
July 't I. The letter continues: 

Has it deliberately embarked upon a career 
of insult to every sentihienl of Irish Natiooal- 
lism, with the undisguised intention of pro- 
voking unothcr outbreak and of reviving the 
methods of Castlereaglr in its supprc3siori?- 
Wltat other inference can be drawn from 
its recent measures? 

It has, it is true, sent there a Chief Secre- 
tary who, before he went, was honosl, 
courageous and intelligent, bat it has stir- ■ 
rounded him with a gang of bigoted re- 
actionaries, by whom he will be thwarted 
and hand-bound in. everything he does or 
attempts. Their latest proceeding, in for- 
bidding the singing of Irish songs, as de- 
scribed- in your issue of this morning, is 
infinite in its'peltiness. H is equally malignant 
in its offensiveness, and it is, in both these 
aspects, a very characteristic product of Ittsb. 
bureaucracy. While lids is the treatment 
measured out to Irish Nationalists, the psendo- 
Ulster bully, before whom the whole Govern- 
ment cowers in craven ineptitude, is perinitlcd 
to go to Belfast to organise and lo. hold his ' 
parly processions and to flaunt once move 
in public all Ih? symbols of political and 
reh^ious ascendancy that have been the course 
of Ulster for a hundred years, not only 
without interference on the (tart ol the polite 
but actually with their active protection. 

Would your leaders like lo fee it =p«i-. 



Ihe 



pil-s 



Is of I),., 



5lsl)act) Urolt 



THE BEST COGNAC 

- — - RODESHEIM (Rheirt) 



PAGE OF THE GERMAN PROPAGANDA ORGAN, "AMERICA IN 
EUROPE," PUBLISHED FOR CIRCULATION AMONG AMERICAN TROOPS 



PAGE KOUhV 



RICA IN EUROPE, 



'German Atrocities" and German Hospital 

Common Sense. now Franklin Hospital. 



i Against some "higher-ups" 



English Atrocities. 



he 


I..T 


is of Mr. 


■ratfs 


absurd accasa 


rial 




ndard Oil 


1IIJ1I 


would fuel ra 




ed 


o produce i 


\ena 


article u r aside 


>nl> 


a: 


' nnaginati. 


: fed 


upon Nick Ca 



stories ami saturate! with blind unci stupid 
Hatred against Germany could ever dream 
of producing two or more members ot the 
German Army sufficiently skilled in the an- 
tiquated art of crucifying. 

Bui arguing on the numberless so called 
German atrocities has long been found to 
he a hopeless task; for him who knows 
Germany more than superficially these stories 
are utterly unbelievable from beginning (o 
end and should not even be mentioned until 
convincing evidence in every single ca.5e is 
brought out. other people who relish, repeat 
and even exaggerate these stories, do not 
want proofs, because- they have previously 
made up their minds to bcli, ■ • ytliing 

detrimental to German; in sir nlra- 

diction to one of the fundamental pui.uples 
ot the Anglo-Saxon system of justice, insisting 
Jtoitt the accused must be held innocent until 
conclusive proof of hit guilt has been furnished, 
it is a fact that nobody is inclined to deviate 
from this principle more readily than the 
Anglo-Saxons themselves as soon as the racial 
point comes into play. "Right or wrong, 
toy country 1 ' is an Aught-Saxon challenge 
and it means nothing else but; wrong be- 
eomes right, when my country is on the 
wrong side. 

The pernicious effect of this campaign 
of professional liars cannot be broken by 
an appeal to the common sense of people 
that have done away with this commodity 
when they delivered themselves every inch 
to the gospel erf haired. Stronger measures 
will be neeessary to spoil the dirty work of, 
men like Balfour, Curzon, Bdnar Law, Herbert 
L. Pratt, Cecil and all the others who stop 
at nothing to sow unnatural hatred between 
America and Germany for the salvation of 
England. 



MISCELLANEOUS. 

The Terror from the Skies. 

The following is no extract from a private 
letter dated London and found on one of 
the battlefields recently: 

"We are in" constant terror of a new 
aerial-attack alarm. 

"We shall not have any nerves lea if this 
sort of thing continues much longer. 

"Oh Lord — what kind of life are wc 
leading now, ever in fear of dead! 

"At Ihe same time wc are lighting batiks 
for a piece of sugar." 

Reuter reports Ibat in the United States 
the Atlantic coast is thrown with lire dead 
bodies of hundreds of whales, sharks and 
other big fishes, victims and proofs of the 
eagerness with which the American U-boat- 
haulers go to work. Very laudable indeed, 
but they should not handle the expensive 



Ten years for following Christ's 
commands! 

The I*. S. Government according to rcccnl 
news from New-York continues to inflict the 

Not less than eighty neu spacers and perio- 
dii -ils. among Ibem forty live socialist publi- 
cations have already b.-c-n suppic-rd mid 
no longer admitted at the post office. The 
secretary of the socialist party cl Hie Stale 

penal s>ivitude for cxhibiliie,- n hi- ofhi e 

an u'*ri| n r.-uhng 

-Don't be a soldier — but a man ' 



Trench Piano Fever 

gains hold on the Soldiers at Gordon, the Atlanta 

"Constitution" says. 

When the United State- entered this war 

preparalii 

that were designed tor the 

tainment of soldiers in the 

Lraptions have resulted, a 

realty been of some use to 

But Ihe latest of.thi-e 



-a "hahy grand" tren< h piano sitting oj 
iie.ii lie:- luuil hank i-f a trench uilh a .qi 

another sipiad calmly jacks oil the enei 
sharpshooters; and with screaming "innmp 
and bullet. Hying overhead unheeded -- 
are vividly portrayed to the mind of ao inn 
inalive trooper. 
Recently an advertisement of the trer 



all of its kind, it was firel looker! over by 
hcadcpiaiters. ih reiving Ihe 0. K. of author- 
ities, it immediately liegan Hie circuit of or- 
ganizations of the camp. 

After looking over the ud ami thinking of 
it, possibilities, one of Hie conniianding of- 



• 



the 



l.ir s.r 



Fever Gaining Gtonmi. 

In the event that the preset pioves suc- 
cessful it is possible thai a '-Sisly fifth Vaude- 
ville Brigade'' will be foiine,! t« do duly with 
the piano batallion. The operations of thee 
unit s niany believe, would he retaliation for 
the use of gas. 

At any rate, the trench piano fever is fust 
gelling a* hold on the camp, and if nothing 



English Kill their Allies Wounded. - Disastrous 

Raid on Largest French Field Hospital by 

British Flying Squadron. — Operation hall 

destroyed - Hundred victims. 



the Fr 



l.r.li- 



llut 



ar had 
aped serious damage. They succeeded in 
bri nking Ihrough I be (lei man barrage and 
towards 6 ci'i lock arrived above the immense 
French Held hospital of Mont .Notre Dame, 
south-east ot Fisnie, conspieuou-ly marked 
Willi the Red Cross of Genevu. It will be 
remembered that these hospitals with thrir 
French-English medical si affs and great quanti- 
ties of material, worth millions of francs, 
fell into German hands during the Aisne 
offensive. They represent Ihe largest medical 
establishments the French have al Ihe Aisne 

off tin enminoiis bombs thai struck in the 
midst of French, Ainencan, German and 
English wounded crowding the extensive 
barracks. One of the bombs bit the section 
for .lysenletc !»■„ nlhirs wrecked the ope- 



French physician atso employed at an ope- 
raling table lost both legs. 

Tie- senior French physician m the name 
of the tliirly French doctors ami (went) 
four French sister*, -till employed al the 
hospitals, expressed to the German eliiel 
doetoi In- il.fjie-l regret and indignation at 
this llagrant and brutal violation of the 
Geneva Convention by Ihe English. Even 
the five English physicians, still ,.n duly 
(here, joined this demonstration. The French, 
American and English wounded etpiv-scd 
themselves mo-l bdleily on Ibis latest ex- 
ploit of heroism by which English tlycrs are 
wont to distinguish themselves Ironl those 
of all other belligerents. Only the swill 
ascend of German flyers, though much less 
num. roils Gun lln- enemy, save,! the hospital 
from still wors.- calamities, the English flyers 



Balfour and the Czecho-Slovaks. 

Lord Balfour- sympathizing with Die Czecho- 
slovaks: 

"Wc can understand that Preside, ii I',,, .-,. 
car* in the name of the French Republic 
sends the Ciecho-Slovaks soldiers a Hag, but 
what has Lord Balfour to do with thai? 
The English minister of Ihe Exterior may 
be well pepared for a crusade in Bohcmiu. 
but we can assure him that he can make 
better use of the surplus or erring knights 
at home, Mr. Balfour should rather dii-eet 
Ills zeal against Sir Carson and instead of 
besieging Bohemian castles he ought lo get 
busy about Ihe "Caslle of Dublin". But we 
are sure, Balfoor won't do anything of the 
kind. The Czecho-Slovaks are far enough 
away to be taken for romantic heroes, white 
the Irish Nationalists are loo near by lo be 
taken for anything else but insubordinate 
people, whom one has lo leach good beha- 
vior with a stick or, as lasi e X| „ .lient, with 
lite help of a bullet." 



AMUSEMENTS. 



KURHAUS BADHOMBURG 



Freitag: Koazerte-r, 



""'';' 



AMUSEMENTS. 



GROSS-FRANKFURT 

:-: WE1N-KLAUSE :-: 

Kunstlersptele. 



Detainer Famiiieiiaufei 



1NTIMES THEATER 

An der Hauptwacho — Anfang 8 Uhr, 
Gesang und Kunsttatue. 

OroSer Erfoig! 



Schumann- 



Theater 

Gastspiel des .Metropoltheaters K'Oln. 
Heute V f. „Wenn im Frithllng" 

mill'.vr r'ranj; und Emmy Si rang- Sturm alsGaste 



KUNSTLER-PALAST 

-2= Arkadia = 

Ab 6. August Gastspiel des 
weltberOhmten Chansoniers 

JEAN MOREAU 

und das tibrige erstklassige 
- :-: :-: Programm :-: :-: 



NEUES THEATER 

Freitag, den 9. August 1918 

Anfang: 8 L'hr. Gcw. Preise. Ende gegen 10 Wir, i 
Zura letzten Male: 

Nur ein Traum. 

Lustsplel In 3 Akten von Lottiar Schmidt 



s.i'11 lag 



I Uhr; Famllle Hannemann. 



CABARETT MAXIM 

Antang 8 Uhr Zell 81 

MAX WALDE, Opcm- und UcdersSnger 
ELFRIEDE SANZl, Prima Ballerin« voiu 
Stadttheattr In Hamburg. 
HEINZ SCHILDBERG 
und das Oblige erstklassige Programm. 



U.T. Kinerna 

„Wenn die Liebe stlrtt" 

KtSsttlch* Hamorejke in 4 Akten. 



PAGE OF THE GER3IAN PROPAGANDA ORGAN, "AMERICA IN 
SUROPE," PUBLISHED FOR CIRCULATION AMONG AMERICAN TROOPS 



